The newly appointed PM Abiy Ahmed (Phd) who met business community last Monday at the Sheraton hotel said that his government will tirelessly work to cut the supply of foreign currency circulating in the black market.
Currently one dollar is sold up to 35 birr in the black market which is more sees a seven birr difference per dollar from the banks.
“We can’t continue like this, the rich people do not have problem if they buy one dollar at 30 or 40 birr but such thing is making hard currency shortage as a government we have strong plan to battle the black market and I would like to say the people who are involving in the black market to stop doing their illegal work.”
Abiy stressed that the black market will not be tolerated anymore and he claimed that operators of the black market that are doing business behind Ethiopia Hotel openly might have much foreign currency available than state owned banks.
“The black market is another area of focus. If some of you are players in the black market, you better stop,” Abiy warned the gathering.
He also called upon them to bring back their money they deposited in China and Dubai.
“We will one day reach the level we can negotiate with foreign countries to bring such deposits as China does. We won’t tolerate people stealing from us and depositing it somewhere else,” he cautioned.
He also said that the country’s foreign currency shortage will not be solved for the next 15 to 20 years.
According to Abiy, the campaign by the Diaspora not to send money to Ethiopia, the black market, and frequent travels by officials are the main factors behind the foreign currency shortages in the country. He said that this is apart from the dwindling export revenues over the past years.
“We are among few African countries that have a huge number of migrants abroad, but ironically, our remittance is much smaller than other African countries,” Abiy said. “Stopping remittance by the diaspora is not the proper way to punish the government. We don’t punish children by denying them their dinners.”
The PM also advised the business community to save their tap water, electricity and fuel consumption.
“Most of us think that we let the light on in our home or office by thinking that we have the money to pay for the bill but what we don’t understand it is the saving that can be used for other people who don’t have a power in their home.”
“As a government we have big problem like corruption. Honestly speaking a lot of development has been done in this government but the corruption is also a huge challenge for us. We don’t need officials to take your money. We need government offices to do the job to make more business in our country not take money from your business, if government officials need to make money, they can leave their office and choose to do another business.’’

In a growing trend many historical places have been demolished in the last couple of months in Addis Ababa. The Kirkos Land Management Bureau last week went to demolish an old G+1 building constructed during the Italian occupation and located at the heart of Kazanchis. The task force however was stopped by an order written from the Addis Ababa Cultural and Tourism Bureau and Authority for Research and Conservation of Cultural Heritage that claim the house is registered as one of the historical sites in the city.
The old house which is currently used by Urban Agriculture Bureau under the Ministry of Agriculture was built 80 years ago by the Italians to serve as a residence. The house lies on 1,000 square meter of land has more than 15 rooms.

Recently the same building which was found in front of this building (in fronmt of Kazanchis TOTAl fuel station) was demolished by the Kirkos Land Management Bureau. The building was also built by the Italians to serve as a worship place.
Source from Urban Agriculture Bureau told Capital that the Land Management Bureau is still trying to demolish the building despite warnings from the government.
“The land Management bureau is eager to demolish and to sell the plot for potential  developer, bureaus who are working on heritages told them not to demolish the houses but they are still trying to demolish it.’’
The Land bureau responded that the building is not incorporated in the new master plan of the city and that is what drives them to demolish and sell the place by lease.
“We are not people who demolished heritages which are the symbols of the country but when we look at the plan, the place does not belong to heritages registered in the city, so based on this plan we were planning to demolish but other government offices told us that the we can’t demolish the place.
But Dereje Seyum, Cultural Heritages officer in Addis Ababa Cultural and Tourism Bureau said that the house was registered eight years ago as a historical site.
“As a nation we have to keep our heritages because this is the symbols of our history. The house was registered as a heritage seven years ago and the land bureau should know that before doing anything.’’
Currently more than 440 house are registered in Addis as historical heritage.
Recently two Ras Abebe Aregay historical houses were demolish within a month gap.
In addition to that many historical houses are found in poor condition due to the small renovation works by the concerned body.

The House of peoples’ Representatives on Thursday unanimously approved the cabinet assembled by the newly appointed Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed (Phd).
The cabinet reshuffle has brought in 10 new faces to the 29–member cabinet, and 19 ministers maintained their positions. The new administration appointed three women.
Defense Minister Siraj Fergesa was moved to Ministry of Transport and was replaced by Motuma Mekassa who was Minister of Mines, Petroleum and Natural Resources.
Shiferaw Shigute goes to Minister of Agriculture and Livestock Resource.
The new appointment replaced Negere Lencho (Phd) as Minister of Government Communication Affairs by former Minister of Transport Ahmed Shide.
The new appointment also give Fozia Ahmed the post of Hirut Woldemariam (Phd) as Minister of Culture and Tourism.
Hirut is moved to head Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs replacing Abdulfetah Abdulah.
Teshoma Toga came from Belgium where he worked as an ambassador and is appointed as Minister of Public Enterprise which was held by Girma Amente.
Unlike the other position the removal Girma Amente raised question from one parliament member.
A woman parliament member said, “Dear PM, I don’t know why you need to replace Girma and as long as we know this man has been doing god job in changing the institution.’’
Uba Mohammed is also appointed to lead Ministry of Communication and Information Technology which was headed by Debretsion Gebremichael (Phd).
Omar Hussain is also appointed to head Ethiopian Revenue and Customs Authority and Melaku Alebel as the new Minister of Trade.
Janterar Abay will lead Minister of Urban Development and Housing and Melesse Alemu will lead Minister of Mines, Petroleum and Natural Resources.
Berhanu Tsegaye replaced Getachew Ambaye  as Attorney General.
Muferihat Kamil became the first Speaker of House of Peoples’ Representatives replacing Abadula Gemeda.
Abadula who had been Speaker of the Parliament for the last seven years moved to the PM office as national security advisor.
“To respond to public demand a cabinet reshuffle is essential. This follows the change of leadership that was enacted in an attempt to change the existing situation in the country,” Abiytold lawmakers.
He told the new ministers to tackle graft and streamline bureaucracy.
“This is a red line that has to be enforced,” said Abiy, who was sworn in on April 2. “What the public is fed up of is graft and maladministration. This will not be tolerated.”

The Ethiopian government applied a policy to expand the textile and garment sector about a decade ago, but due to lack of the expected success, about two years ago it focused on the development of industry zones to attract global companies to engage in the development of the sector and expand the hard currency earnings from the manufacturing industry.
However it begun such development recently that has been applied in other countries including Asian countries for the last many years.
The experience of Bangladesh is one of the best benchmark for the implementation of processing zones in Ethiopia. The south Asian country registered marvelous achievements in terms of moving forward the economic transformation, massive job creation and alleviating the challenge of hard currency earning and even introducing the country for every part of households in the world by products tagged ‘Made in Bangladesh’.
Data indicated that the country earned almost nil when it started the processing zone in 1983/84 but it has now earned close to USD 63 billion from export. About a decade ago the figure stood at USD 14 billion; it indicated that how the sector registers significant development in the past ten years.
The major move the government of Bangladesh did was the formation of export processing zones in different part of the country. According to officials of the Bangladesh Export Processing Zones Authority (BEPZA) there are currently eight export processing zones in different corners of Bangladesh.
The sector played crucial role to expand the export diversification operation of the country since the target of most of the manufacturers is the export market mainly multinational companies.
According to the information Capital obtained from the authority, the history of the formation of zones started in 1980, a year when parliament of Bangladesh ratified a law for the formation of BEPZA.
As of the formation, BEPZA is engaged in attracting and facilitating foreign and local investments in the export processing zones in the country, and expanding the room for investors to invest easily.

The first processing zone was established at the logistics and main port hub of Bangladesh, Chittagong city in 1983. Information indicates that currently about 200 companies/factories invested at Chittagong, which is located at Bay of Bengal.
The export processing zone established at Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, followed the sea side zone since it becomes operation in 1993. Officials at the zone said that investors from 38 countries invested in the processing zone located at the capital. Currently, 264 foreign companies, 72 joint venture companies and 135 local companies are operational at the processing zone.
Reporters from Capital have got a chance to look the facility that includes several international companies including well known garment brand producers. The total investment there is over USD 4.5 billion and the export has reached USD 24 billion, according to the information from the official site of BEPZA. At the facility a total of 87,000 people are engaged on duty, while the share of female employees is 64 percent just similar with other zones in the country.
The garment industry in the country is very huge that has also expanded not only by the government but the private sectors also. The information that Capital obtained from officials at Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Bangladesh reads that currently about 6,000 garment industries are operating in the country and the number of employment created by the sector is 6 million with female employees taking the majority.
However its garment industry uses imported fabrics from different sources mainly from China. “We have textile industries in the country, but the high demand on the garment sector forced us to import the fabric, which consumed some of the export earnings” an official at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Bangladesh said.
The GDP and export growth of the country has registered significant growth in the past two decades, according to international organizations like the World Bank report. The export processing zones has played crucial role to gain these achievements.
It is also clearly observed that representatives’ of the authority are still eager to expand the contribution of investments more. The country has also targeted to expand the private and state owned zones to expand the generation and production of the industry sector by diversifying to other sectors besides the textile and garment industry. Abul Hassan Mahmood, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Bangladesh, told journalists that come from different countries, that the pharmaceutical sector is also the other upcoming industry in the country.
He said that the sector has registered significant growth in the past few years and even enable to entertain huge markets like the US. The sector actors said that the country has almost covered its demand from local sources except very little type of items. The pharmaceutical sector of the country can grow at 15 percent for the next five years riding on the expanded domestic market as well as new export frontiers, according research.
The pharma industry of Bangladesh meets 98 percent of the local demand and exports to more than 151 countries. The sector is also dominated by local investors, who cover 90 percent of the production in the country. In 1981, 75 percent of the medicine was imported by multinational companies.
According to officials of Square Pharmaceutical Limited, which is the biggest pharmaceutical company in Bangladesh, there are 267 companies in the country that are engaged on the production of the pharmaceutical sector. Out of the stated number 50 of them dominates 99 percent of the production.
Jute and jute goods are also the new promising industry for an export that generates close to USD one billion last year. Jute is a long, soft, shiny vegetable fiber that can be spun into coarse, strong threads. It is produced primarily from plants in the genus Corchorus.
Since the country grow 6 to 7 percent in the past two decades the economy registered significant changes that allowed joining the lower ladder middle income country lists with such huge population of 160 million.