Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed (Phd) will address the Djibouti parliament today Sunday April 29, in his first foreign visit.
PM Abiy, who was elected on April 2 by the parliament, was full of activity by visiting and delivering speeches in regional states around the country.
He will also held bilateral talks with authorities in Djibouti, which is the main sea gateway for Ethiopia.
The relation of Ethiopia and Djibouti is in good condition besides the initial low level tie at the beginning of the EPRDF lead transitional government came to power in early 1990s. The bondage of the two countries become warmer, when Ethiopia the most populous nation without sea outlet, moves its ports activity to Djibouti after the border conflict between Eritrea in 1998.
Currently Ethiopia and Djibouti have various social and economic co-operations and are stated as an example for regional integrations in the continent. They have linked with optical fiber cable, electric, water and modern electrical railway and have agreed with several upcoming co-operations including the construction of natural gas pipelines and facilitate joint customs facility in addition to open school for Ethiopian community in Djibouti city.
The former PM Hailemariam Dessalegn is the first Ethiopian head of government to pay the first official state visit to Djibouti in 2015, while leaders before him made several visits at the neighboring nation. Experts stated that however Ethiopia has high demand to expand options to use some other ports in the region, at the current level ports in Djibouti are more feasible in terms of modern infrastructure like railway and other alternatives.
PM Abiy to address Djiboutian parliament today
Forex crunch affecting FDI
The current hard currency crunch that affects the activity of industries is now challenging the attraction of foreign direct investment (FDI) to the country.
It has been reported that the hard currency shortage has been observed in the past many years, while the recent effect is much higher than what was observed before.
The business community engaged in the import business has been claiming that they are unable to run their business as usual. On the other side the manufacturing industry that is mainly aligned with hard currency to import raw materials and parts for machines claimed that they are forced to undertake their operation with not more than 10 percent of their capacity.
It is also indicated that some of the international investors, who are mainly engaged on huge investments that local investors do not have the know-how or capital, also suffered from lack of hard currency to transfer their dividend out of the country.
Potential upcoming FDIs who are informed about the forex crunch are said to be rethinking their investment in the country.
A company called Square Pharmaceuticals Limited, the flagship company of Square Group, a Bangladeshi company has changed its mind to invest in Ethiopia after it got information that it would be difficult for it to transfer back its dividend within short period of time. The company then changed its first plan and went to Kenya.
The company which is a leader on the pharmaceutical industry in its country was first interested to invest in Ethiopia since the government of Bangladesh allowed the company to invest out of the country as a pilot project.
“Now our company, which is the biggest pharmaceutical industry in Bangladesh that has 267 pharmaceutical industries, has decided to invest in Kenya,” an official at the company said.
About two years ago a Bangladeshi DBL Group, a platinum supplier for H&M, a Swedish based global clothing retail giant, has got promotional support from its government to invest out of the country and is now engaged in integrated industrial complex with over USD 100 million investment in Meqele, Ethiopia.
The developing nation of Bangladesh does not allow local investments to go out of the country, while it has provided permit for the first time to DBL to invest outside the nation as a model. The company has secured significant finance from the state owned Development Bank of Ethiopia and Sewedfund, a parastatal organization in Sweden for its investment in Ethiopia.
Officials at Square told Capital that DBL has been allowed to invest outside Bangladesh “but our case is special since we got a green light to come up with equity from our country to invest outside our nation,” they said.
Square Pharmaceutical that has over 17 percent market share in its country has an experience of 60 years and annual sales of USD 417 million.
Ethiopia has become a favorite FDI destination since it facilitates several preferential advantages to absorb foreign investors. For instance the government is facilitating land with very low lease rate, low electric tariff and the cheap labour is also the another big advantage that FIDs are interested to invest in the country.
In the first half of the current budget year the country attracted USD 2.2 billion FDI according to the data from Ethiopia Investment Commission.
Somali Region continues to be epicenter of drought, according to WFP
A recent report from the World Food Program shows that 7.88 million people in Ethiopia will require food assistance in 2018 and the Somali Region remains to be the epicenter of the drought, with an estimated 1.8 million people in need of lifesaving food assistance.
The update report states that there are an estimated 1.7 million Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in Ethiopia, of which, an estimated 461,000 conflict induced IDPs are in the Somali Region.
Currently, the WFP is providing emergency relief assistance to the Somali Region while the government of Ethiopia and the joint Emergency Operation Program an NGO consortium provide relief assistance to the rest of the country.
According to the report, the 1.7 million IDPs in the Somalia Region was driven by factors ranging from conflict, environmental degradation, natural and manmade disasters, changing livelihood strategies in an evolving political economy, poverty, and progressive depletion of coping mechanisms available to the displaced and host communities.
It further states that below-average spring rains, combined with extremely low household livestock holdings, suggest the ongoing food security situation in south-eastern Ethiopia will continue through most of 2018. Sustained, large-scale assistance is needed to mitigate the risk of increases in acute malnutrition and a further deterioration of outcomes, particularly in the Somali Region.
Currently, WFP’s emergency relief assistance in the Somali Region comprises of a combination of food and cash based modalities, depending on system readiness, nutritional needs and where markets function. The report also states that the re-targeting and registration of beneficiaries that will receive cash and/or food transfers under the 2018 HDRP is ongoing.
According to the Humanitarian Disaster resilience Plan released in March by the Ethiopian government and humanitarian partners, most of the 2017 humanitarian needs are carried over into 2018 given insufficient recovery opportunities, compounded by the underperformance of the 2017 autumn rains; the prevalence of risk factors for communicable disease outbreaks such as AWD and measles; as well as large scale displacement due to drought and conflict.
The appeal seeks USD 1.66 billion to reach 7.88 million people with emergency food/cash and non-food assistance, mainly in the southern and south-eastern parts of the country. Due to many other humanitarian crisis around the world, meeting the needed funding will be a challenge, it has been said.
World Press Freedom Index: Ethiopia among the worst places for press freedom
The 2018 World Press Freedom Index that is published by Reporters Without Boarders annually, puts Ethiopia at 150th place out of 180 countries, describing it as one of the worst places for press freedom and journalists.
According to the Index, in Ethiopia, terrorism charges have been systematically used against journalists ever since the 2009 terrorism law took effect. It states that the charges carry long jail sentences and allow the authorities to hold journalists without trial for extended periods.
The Index also states that there has been no significant improvement since the purges that led to the closure of six newspapers in 2014 and drove around 30 journalists into exile. On the contrary, another six-month state of emergency was proclaimed in February 2018, which the government could again use to arrest critical journalists and ban the public from watching or listening to certain broadcast media.
‘The Internet and social networks are often disconnected while physical and verbal threats, arbitrary trials, and convictions are all used to silence the media. On the other hand, it is to be noted that the Ethiopian government recently released a few journalists that were imprisoned’ the index states.
The Index ranks 180 countries according to the level of freedom available to journalists. It is a snapshot of the media freedom situation based on an evaluation of pluralism, independence of the media, quality of legislative framework and safety of journalists in each country. It does not rank public policies even if governments obviously have a major impact on their country’s ranking. Nor is it an indicator of the quality of journalism in each country.
Regarding getting data on abuse, the Index states that a team of in-house specialists, each assigned to a different geographical region, keeps a detailed tally of abuses and violence against journalists and media outlets. These researchers also rely on a network of correspondents in 130 countries.
The Abuses indicator for each country is calculated on the basis of the data about the intensity of abuses and violence against media actors during the period evaluated. This quantitative indicator is then used to weight the qualitative analysis of the situation in the country based on the replies to the questionnaires.
