In its first year of operation Ethiopian Reinsurance (Ethiopian Re) lost 60.9 million birr.
The company, which began operating a year and half ago, held its second general assembly at Hilton. During the meeting with shareholders the company leaders declared their losses.
They said that the reinsurance firm has been engaged in establishing and hiring professionals. Even though it lost money they registered 519.8 million birr in gross premiums.
The report stated that from the total premiums, 194 million birr or 37 percent was generated from compulsory treaty cession. The major premium earning or 62 percent came from compulsory policy cession. The premium registered from compulsory policy cession was 322 million birr, while about 4 million birr worth of premiums were written under facultative voluntary cession from local markets, according to the report.
The annual report stated that the general insurance sector made up over 96 percent of their business, while the three percent of premiums were secured from life business.
The motor sector has taken the lion’s share from the total premiums at 228 million birr, followed by fire and marine policies at 67 and 61 million birr respectively.
For the year the company has paid 82 million birr for claims, 122 million birr in ceding commission and 45 million birr in profit commission.
The company also stated that it wants to be rated by international rating firms to be competitive on the international market and to write foreign business, which is considered a means of hard currency earnings for the company.
The company officials stated that until last October it was engaged in organizing offices and assigning staff.
The board of directors and head of the company has explained about the performance of the company for the stated year.
Shareholders that are mainly financial firms claimed that a lot of idle funds were not included as a most profitable time deposit. The report stated that 263 million birr was put as cash and the 238 million birr is owned by the Commercial Bank of Ethiopia (CBE), which is one of the two major shareholders at the Ethiopian Re. Shareholders said that that the company will engage in other investments during the year.
Yewondwossen Etefa, CEO of Ethiopian Re, said that the report reviewed the performance of the fiscal year that ended on June 30, 2017. “Currently the time despots have substantially changed because collections are now growing,” he added. He said that time deposit is considered as investment.
From the total written premiums, insurance companies have allocated 30 percent for the purchase of reinsurance. The National Bank of Ethiopia directive made insurance companies pay five percent of every premium for the Ethiopian Re.
Ethiopian Reinsurance SC was established with a paid up capital of 500 million birr and one billion birr subscribed capital.
Ethiopian Reinsurance suffers 60m birr loss
Giddy about geothermal
Ethiopian Electric Power (EEP) signed its first power purchase agreement with Corbetti Geothermal on December 19 to buy geothermal power over the next twenty five years.
The Geothermal project which costs USD four billion is located in Corbetti (East Arsi Zone). The Tulu Moye and Abaya projects are excepted to be completed in the next eight years. Each could generate up to 500 megawatts.
According to the deal EEP will pay USD 0.75/kwh for purchasing power from Corbetti and USD 0.695/kwh for Moye and Abaya geothermal power.
Corbetti Geothermal was initially formed by an Ethiopian affiliated company called Rift Valley Geothermal and its Icelandic partner Reykjavik Geothermal. Currently Berkley Energy and Iceland Drilling have joined the company. Berkley is the major shareholder with at 53 percent.
Eng. Azeb Asnake, CEO of EEP and representatives of Corbetti Geothermal; Luca Buljani and Edi Nijorge signed the agreement.
Eng. Azeb said the projects will help Ethiopia meet its power demand.
TECNO launches its newest addition, Phantom 8, in Ethiopia
TECNO launched its newest addition, the Phantom 8, in Ethiopia on Saturday, December, 23, 2017. The newly launched Android Phantom 8, features a revolutionary camera, attractive design and high speed processor.
“The Ethiopian market is very dynamic and one that appreciates intelligent innovation coupled with aesthetically pleasing design. The all-new Phantom 8 embraces the region’s requirement and is more powerful than ever in both speed and photo quality,” said Chen Haiying, Brand Manager of TECNO Mobile.
TECNO Mobile’s Phantom 8 comes with a front facing camera at 20 megapixels alongside a smart dual selfie flash. Moreover, the double front ring flash ensures taking photos even in a low light environment. It also enables to have a 150 minutes of talk time with only 10 minutes of battery charge.
Phantom 8’s diamond style design comes with a 3D Lighting, unibody metal edge and a 2.5 D Drip Screen-curved battery cover. It also possesses a 6 GB RAM plus 2.6 GHz CPU ultra-fast experience that supports 4G+ and download speed up to 300Mbps.
The new Phantom 8 is compatible with Micro SIM Card and support up to 2TB (Terra Bytes) TF (Trans Flash) Card, and it holds 4modules, 20 bands and covers more than 200 countries and zones.
Save the Children: Resources are scarce to address continuing and emerging humanitarian crisis
Resources are spreading thinly to address humanitarian crisis Ethiopia is facing due to the effects of the drought that occurred in 2015, according to Save the Children. Issues of funding are especially difficult now due to new humanitarian crisis of internally displaced people due to conflict, the agency stated.
“Looking at the recent conflict especially alongside the border of the Oromia and Somali regions and the displaced population, especially children, we are supporting with the access of food, education, clean water and hygiene and sanitation kits for households,” said Roba Halake, Senior Humaniterian Manager at Save the Children
Roba further said that “Obviously there are people that were displaced by the drought we are supporting, on top of that now we have people that have been displaced by conflict and this thinly spreads the resource that we have. The external funding environment is challenging not only for us but for all agencies that work in humanitarian response.”
Save the Children currently provides support for the displaced population with a focus on displaced children. The Agency does its response work following already existing operational footprints. “Funding these days is a problem. Save the Children is doing its best to find ways to address those problems in terms of fund raising, we are continuing our efforts to fundraise and respond to all emerging humanitarian crisis,” Roba said.
Speaking on the Acute Watery Diarrhea (AWD), Save the Children is responding in four regions with the highest number of cases seen in the Somali Region and smaller outbreaks in the Tigray, Afar and Amhara Regions.
“We are working very closely with the regional health bureau and I think one of the positive things that has come is that the regional health bureaus and health staff has gained a lot of experience through these responses, so when there are new outbreaks, we are able to respond more quickly and more effectively,” said Sam Wood, Humanitarian Director at Save the Children.
He also noted that the Agency is not just providing curative treatments to people once they have contracted AWD, but also preventative with health messages to insure people keep themselves safe.
Answering question regarding death rate from AWD, Wood stated “We don’t record data about death so we do not have information about that but we have certainly seen a large number of people contracting AWD and the risks are very significant if you don’t respond quickly. Our focus has been strengthening systems so we can respond quickly and prevent unnecessary deaths.”
