The closing of the weighed facility at the Bure Warehouse at the Ethiopian Commodity Exchange (ECX) forced traders to load their products on trucks for over ten days.
Traders that Capital talked said that since September 25 the weigh facility at Bure has stopped services due to technical problems.
They said that even though ECX has information about the problem it did not work to correct it. Traders who wanted anonymity told Capital that due to the disruption the weigh trucks have been forced to wait at the center for almost two weeks.
“As a solution an optional small weight has been provided but labour who moves grains from trucks to warehouses are asking for additional payment for every bag, which are mostly 100 kilograms,” traders said.
This is unacceptable since it will increase the cost of the product and make it unfeasible compared with the selling price, according to traders.
They complained that the product mainly soybeans is not getting ECX warehouse in the past two weeks that makes the price to hike in the trading floor that is located at the heart of Addis Ababa, around Mexico Square.
According to people working in the business, the price of the commodity has increased by about 160 birr in the past few days. The ECX October 1 trading data shows that Bure Soybeans sold for up to 1,685 birr per quintal. “As a result, there is a scarcity of the product at the ECX warehouse and the price has gone up,” one of the traders expressed. He said the price was about 1,500 birr per quintal before the problem happened at Bure.
He expressed his concern that if the problem is not solved shortly the price of their product might significantly drop. “The product stacked at Bure was harvested during the past season but the new harvesting has arrived so our product might lose value,” a trader waiting to move his product said.
They said all actors like traders, transporters and truck owners are being affected.
Netsanet Tesfaye, Public Relation Head at ECX, told Capital that the case has been identified. “We are using leased weigh at Bure so far I have information that the equipment that will replace the existing machine has arrived at Djibouti Port and its expected the operation will recommence by tomorrow,” he said.
ECX, the electronic trading floor, has commenced the exclusive trading of soybean late last year. Since then the trading and export of the bean has shown significant growth. Bure that is located 410km northwest of Addis Ababa is one of the 21 warehouses ECX operates. It has a capacity of 100,000 quintals of grain, while the biggest facility is located at Humera, 988km northwest of the capital, with a capacity to handle 350, 000 quintals.