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This report gives an overview of Ethiopia's overview. It includes background, political issues, security concerns, economy, and U.S. foreign assistance

This report gives an overview of Ethiopia's overview. It includes background, political issues, security concerns, economy, and U.S. foreign assistance

Ethiopia officially launched the District Level Decentralization Program (DLDP) by the year 2002. The program flagged core objectives such as institutionalizing viable development centers at local levels, deepening devolution of power, enhancing the democratization process through broad-based participatory strategy, promoting good governance and improving service delivery. Since the inception of this program two strategic planning terms (one strategic term is five years) have already elapsed and the third is in a process. However, various program implementation reports and results on the ground narrowly justified the success of this program. Perception, conscious and voluntary participation of all the various stakeholders in general and communities at grassroots level in particular were not as apparent as initially desired. Thus, a cross-sectional, embedded single case study, which is essentially qualitative, was conducted in Dendi district of Oromia State to find out how this program proceeds, focusing on: institutional strengths, transfer of authority and resource, implementation, perception and participation of the stakeholders and actual benefits gained at grassroots level. Data were collected through interviews, observation and focus group discussions. Conceptual analyses and explanations were presented to show how the program progressed and stumbling blocks encountered. While the theory of democratic decentralization was taken as a domain theory, theories such as neopatrimonialism, congruence, equilibrium view of institutions, sequential theory of decentralization and other theories relating to people's participation were selectively reviewed in the literature and pervasively taken on when successive analyses, explanations and reflections were made. The findings indicate a need for more focused and planned approaches for the success of the program. Institutionalizing the district and the lowest tiers has not yet been achieved. While no inconsistency was observed in models used to transfer resources and authority, shortages and lack of dynamic capability of local implementers to properly utilize the power and resources transferred were evident at all levels. Perception and participation of stakeholders is an area that needs a paradigm shift. Achievements on the ground have not yet justified the efforts made or the program goals. Besides generating valuable ideas for scientific discourse, critical reflections and a set of proposals and recommendations - as possible solutions for some of the problems observed - have been provided in this work. Introduction of appropriate planning, enhancing the capability of local bodies to match the ever changing local and global conditions, rethinking on certain policy and program changes and meaningful participation of stakeholders, efficient use of available resources, etc. were among issues identified for consideration.

On November, 4th 2020, the Tigrayan Area became one of the deadly conflict hotspots in the midst of the global pandemic Covid-19. The conflicts are rooted since the Ethiopian People's Democratic Front (EPRDF) becoming the governing party 30 years ago that reigned by corrupt, dirty, discriminate governance. EPRDF was in coalition with four parties: Amhara Democratic Party (ADP); The Oromo Democratic Party (ODP); Southern Ethiopian People's Democratic Party Movement (SEPDPM); and Tigrayan People's Liberation Front (TPLF). Among the four parties, only the TPLF has been promoted and acquired privileges by the EPRDF. These privileges provide TPLF an influence, an important political position, and a military sector, which creates other parties feel excluded. Political friction, sexual violence, and even the issue of ethnic cleansing of Tigrayans underlie the crisis. Since Abiy Ahmed from ODP become a new PM of Ethiopia, it is strongly indicated that his position indirectly supports reprisal against TPLF. The involvement of Eritrea in this conflict, expanding the spectrum of crisis. Deadlock on the solution and the unilateral claims of the Abiy's successful (offensive) settlement against TPLF, agonizing the situation of the Tigrayan people. Therefore, in this essay, the author will explain how the characteristics of the current conflict situation, the ripeness of conflict, methods of resolution of mediation, and possible solution to construct a stable situation in the Tigray Conflict. Key Words: Abiy, Afrika, Amhara, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Oromo, Tigray, TPLF

Because agriculture is the economic backbone of most countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, including Ethiopia, any meaningful sustainable development program in the continent must therefore be anchored in the sector. The concept for this study on agribusiness indicators was based on the vital role that agribusiness plays in agricultural development. The study focuses on agribusiness indicators (ABI) to identify and isolate the determining factors that lead private investors and other stakeholders to participate in agribusiness and to engage in discourse regarding its development. A more thorough empirical understanding of these determinants in turn can usefully inform the types of policy reforms that can promote agribusiness in Africa. In Ethiopia, the ABI team focused on the following success factors: a) access to critical factors of production of certified hybrid seeds, fertilizer, and mechanical input; b) enabling environment in terms of access of credit and transportation; and c) government expenditures on agriculture, and trade and regulatory policies that currently influence the agribusiness environment. The factors and indicators that the research team has included in this study are not exhaustive but rather are intended to serve as a pilot that could be scaled up to include more variables and countries. The findings of the study revealed the dominant role of the government in the seed and fertilizer markets. In the seed sub-sector, perennial shortages of both basic and certified seeds have greatly limited agricultural productivity in Ethiopia.

The urban population in Ethiopia is increasing rapidly. If managed proactively, urban population growth presents a huge opportunity to shift the structure and location of economic activity from rural agriculture to the larger and more diversified urban industrial and service sectors. If not managed proactively, rapid urban population growth may pose a demographic challenge as cities struggle to provide jobs, infrastructure and services, and housing. The central challenge for the Ethiopian Government is to make sure that cities are attractive places in which to work and live, while fostering smart urbanization. Making urbanization a national priority will accelerate Ethiopia's progress towards reaching middle-income status. The government has already taken steps to make evidence-based, informed decisions for well-managed urban growth, and this report aims to contribute to those efforts.

The United States is losing the competition for global power to China, especially on the African continent. This thesis aims to analyze opportunities for the United States to take advantage of China's withdrawal from Ethiopia in order to develop relations with the quickly growing country and influence the country toward democratization. This author found that while democracy is not likely, through increasing relations with Ethiopia's prime minister, the United States has an opportunity to push for increased individual freedoms for Ethiopians. The author relied on open-source information and strategic analytic techniques often employed by the U.S. intelligence community.

This [paper] is a desk study based on accessible documents and literature on adult education (AE) including training in Ethiopia. The work attempts to portray current (1991-2008) AE as understood and operated in Ethiopia under the Federal Ministry of Education (for convenience, MoE) and/or Regional Education Bureaus (REBs). The study is about provision and practice. It is not about answering a set of research questions. The purpose of the effort is to fill a gap on the subject of AE in the country. … This study is organized into thirteen parts including this one. Parts Two and Three lay the foundation by presenting terminology and historical bases of AE. The policy environment, provision and providers, participation, funding, staffing, training and higher education institutions, teaching and learning materials development, and research and evaluation follow Part Three each occupying a separate part. The last two parts are on international contacts and cooperation, and trends and challenges. A glossary of AE terms concludes the work. The directory of providers is also annexed. (DIPF/Orig.)

The study assessed the customs valuation system applied in Ethiopia and investigated the existing problems in the system. The methods adopted in the study include documentary analysis, in-depth interview and self administered questionnaires. The results suggested that the Customs Valuation System in Ethiopia does not provide fair, neutral and uniform valuation and does not effectively protect traders from risk of arbitrary valuation by the customs officers. There is also risk of revenue loss to the government due to underinvoicing of imports by the traders since controlling mechanisms such as Post Clearance Audit (PCA) are not adequately developed. Therefore, the Government of Ethiopia needs to strengthen the controlling mechanisms within the customs valuation system since duties and taxes on foreign trade contribute the significant portion of its tax and duty revenues

The study assessed the customs valuation system applied in Ethiopia and investigated the existing problems in the system. The methods adopted in the study include documentary analysis, in-depth interview and self administered questionnaires. The results suggested that the Customs Valuation System in Ethiopia does not provide fair, neutral and uniform valuation and does not effectively protect traders from risk of arbitrary valuation by the customs officers. There is also risk of revenue loss to the government due to underinvoicing of imports by the traders since controlling mechanisms such as Post Clearance Audit (PCA) are not adequately developed. Therefore, the Government of Ethiopia needs to strengthen the controlling mechanisms within the customs valuation system since duties and taxes on foreign trade contribute the significant portion of its tax and duty revenues

Ethiopia has been facing an increased return of migrants, as a result of mass deportation from countries like Saudi Arabia, The Government of Ethiopia, together with other humanitarian actors successfully managed the return but, due to the absence of a national framework on reintegration, the reintegration component was not addressed. Hence this report presents the recommended approach for developing a reintegration package for return migrants in Ethiopia. This package is expected to serve as a point of reference and practical guide for the Government of Ethiopia, UN agencies, civil society organizations and other stakeholders to develop programs in support of the successful reintegration of returnees, back into their community and labour market.

There exists no generally accepted definition of the term "capital flight". For the purpose of this article capital flight refers to Illegal capital flight, also known as illicit financial flows, which disappear from any record in the country of origin. Moreover earnings on the stock of illegal capital flight outside of a country generally do not return to the country of origin. In this regard, capital flight is creating a serious development challenges for most African economies. Ethiopia is not exceptional for this impact. The analysis of this article led to two major findings. First, African countries have become increasingly indebted; they experienced large scale capital flight. According to studies a group of 33 SSA (Sub- Saharan Africa) countries has lost a total of $814 billion dollars from 1970 to 2010. This exceeds the amount of official development aid ($659 billion) and foreign direct investment ($306 billion) received by these countries. Oil-rich countries account for 72 percent of the total capital flight from the sub region ($591 billion). Secondly, an upcoming report by Global Financial Integrity 2009, finds that Ethiopia, which has a per-capita GDP of just US$365, lost US$11.7 billion to illicit financial outflows between 2000 and 2009. In 2009, illicit money leaving the economy totaled US$3.26 billion, which is double the amount in each of the two previous years. In conclusion, currently the impact of capital flight for Ethiopia economy is becoming very severe. So, Ethiopian government effort to promoting economic development must be go hand in hand with fighting capital flight

Ethiopia's remarkable socio-economic transformation over the last decade has been marked by: a reorientation of expenditure from recurrent to capital; a significant devolution of resources from Federal Government to Regions; and a clear prioritization of infrastructure spending, while protecting spending on education at four percent of GDP. The Government of Ethiopia has also leveraged external resources to boost spending in pro-poor sectors, particularly health and social protection. As a result, Ethiopia is home to the largest social safety net program in Africa, and has also achieved remarkable health outcomes using cost effective approaches. Recent investments have seen a significant build-up of capital stock, with capital spending at sector level pointing towards increased service capacity. The current public investment-led strategy requires to be complemented by increased budgetary provisions in operations and maintenance so that new investments translate into enhanced service coverage and delivery. As Ethiopia lays the foundation to become a middle income country, and the changing global environment implies declining external assistance, it is imperative that domestic taxation activity support this transition. The current tax-to-GDP ratio is low compared to peer countries, and the tax structure would benefit from increased contributions by direct tax sources. Therefore, there is an immediate need for advancing tax reforms and improve capacity and quality of tax administration. Broadening the tax bases, through review of exemptions, as well as review of tax rates might be venues to consider. Additional revenues will create the much-needed fiscal space to increase funding for operations and maintenance for service delivery, and support fiscal sustainability. As a follow-up to this Public Expenditure Review, the Government of Ethiopia has asked the World Bank to provide further analytical support, with a view to enhance domestic revenue mobilization through simpler and more efficient taxation, while retaining equity priorities in public finances.

Ethiopian coffee production and its productivity level are unsatisfactory to uphold the country's comparative advantage. The study intends to examine possible reasons for low productive performance of coffee using cross sectional data gathered from Jimma zone. An attempt to measure technical efficiency of coffee producers, analysis of its determinants and the impact of various distributional assumptions on technical efficiency estimates is made. Accordingly, both error component model and technical inefficiency effects model have been estimated in one step approach after data have been transformed. Maximum likelihood estimate of technical efficiency was obtained from truncated normal model which was supposed to describe the data adequately. The result revealed that various distributional assumptions of technical inefficiency have approximately similar impact of on TE estimates. On average, coffee producers are 72% efficient, implying that there is ample opportunity for these farmers to raise output level at present technology. There is also advantage of scale economies linked to increasing returns to boost output. Except fertilizer, overutilization of other inputs leads to inefficiency. Technical inefficiency effects are modeled as a function of farmer specific socio-economic factors. Education, distance, family pressure and poor soil fertility tends to increase technical inefficiency of farmers whereas off farm income, proximity to market, cereal crop production, sex and good soil fertility improves their technical efficiency. Farmers can still produce higher output under available technology, indeed. Therefore, government should target at development of rural infrastructure, work diversification, rural employment creation, promotion of rural female management through awareness creation and soil conservation to overturn output loss by technical inefficiency of coffee producers in Jimma zone

The fragile and inefficient state-dominated banking sector that existed in Ethiopia during the military government (1974-1991) was a major hindrance to economic growth. Since it took power in 1991, the current government has implemented a number of reforms. For instance, in 1994, the government legalized domestic private investment in the banking industry. In addition, it restructured the two development banks as commercial banks, and introduced a new Banking and Monetary Proclamation that gave more autonomy and further clarified the National Bank of Ethiopias activities as the regulator and supervisor of the banking sector. Although these measures have led to marginal improvements in efficiency and competition, there is a great need for additional market oriented reforms to further enhance the sectors role in mobilizing savings and allocating funds to their optimum usage. The purpose of this paper was to analyze additional market-based policy initiatives undertaken by the government to determine if they would further enhance the efficiency of the banking sector in Ethiopia. Based on the results of the data analysis it may be concluded that the Ethiopian government needs to further strategize and take the following steps: a) reverse the decision prohibiting foreign banks from investing in the country, b) fully privatize the state-owned commercial banks, c) allow market forces to determine interest rates and the exchange rate of the Ethiopian currency, Birr (ETB), and d) upgrade the regulatory and supervisory capacity of the National Bank of Ethiopia to facilitate efficiency in the banking market.