The Addis Ababa City Administration Housing Development and Administration Agency will launch a new housing scheme on plots collected from city dwellers who agreed to be part of a new housing project.
In the past eight months in its ‘Base Solution Project’, Gojo Marketing Service has registered willing residents of the city who have a title deed of 500 meter square and above to include them in the new housing scheme based on its pilot project agreement with the Housing Development and Administration Agency.
Nadew Getahun, General Manager of Gojo, said that initially the idea was discussed with the Ministry of Urban Development and Construction which accepted the case and transferred it to the Addis Ababa administration, who is trying to slash the housing problem in the city.
“Based on our discussion with the city officials, the Housing Development and Administration Agency they have given the green light for Gojo to come up with 1,000 title deeds to be part of the standard of the housing project via apartments of at least 60 houses with G+12 floors,” Nadew said at a press conference held at Ethiopian Sky Light Hotel on Thursday July 11.
He said that based on the go ahead, Gojo has registered dwellers, which are willing to give their title deeds for the project and part of the development with several benefits. “In the initial stage we have transferred all the documents of the 1,000 plots to the city agency, who is interested in coming up with more options,” he explained.
Based on that an additional 700 plots were registered and the documents have been transferred to the city agency. According to statement from Gojo Marketing Services, so far two million sqm of plots have been registered from 1,700 title deeds and transferred to the city administration, who will organize a residential housing association of people looking for their own house to begin building on the plots.
Based on the pilot strategy and design about 60 residential houses will be constructed on every 500 square meter plot, while members of the associations associated with every project should pay an initial payment that will transfer to the original title deed owner and settle the lease payment and well performed contractors selected by the city administration will manage the project.
Banks are also expected to be part of the project in their financial scheme to cover some costs that will be settled by residents on long term manner.
Residents willing to share their plot will also have additional houses on their plots without additional payments like other members of the association.
“In the trends that we observed the government takes a plot and transfers to developers and provides a replacement plot to initial owners. I have been a victim of such kind situations, while our project will give a solution from displacement and provide additional options for the housing,” Nadew told Capital.
In the land collection process the biggest plot registered was 63,000 sqm located around Gotera and the minimum rate is 500 sqm.
Yeka and Bole Sub Cities are major areas that have a large number of plots.
Based on the scheme up to 300,000 residential houses will be built, while the city administration shall collect about 2.1 billion birr from leases and business centers in the buildings.
According to Nadew, the pilot scheme shows that it shall facilitate further plots for the government without displacement that the city government will follow a similar trend in the future since it will access plots for its own housing schemes on a mutual benefit basis.
City announces new housing program with co-housing plots
Legislation to standardize dairy products
The Ethiopian Meat and Dairy Industry Development Institute (EMDIDI) is concerned about lack of regulation with regard to milk and dairy products, so they are preparing a new legal frame work for the dairy sector. This will allow for fines or for jail time when people distribute, produce or sell below standard dairy products.
The legislation will enforce standards regarding: taste, health benefits, clean labels, healthier ingredients, eco-friendly packaging, functional benefits and innovative ingredients.
The framework is expected to be applied by next Ethiopian year. The goal is to enhance and promote sustainability of the dairy industry. Notably, it will also seek to promote consumption of safe and quality of milk by ensuring conformance by all players in the dairy sector.
Compared to the current working dairy market the draft framework tightens control of how milk-yielding animals are bred, how raw milk is purchased and the production and sales of dairy food. Those who violate safety standards or do not enforce quality control, will be prosecuted.
Ethiopia’s dairy industry, which is being challenged by low productivity per cow, inadequate extension, fluctuating milk production, low quality feeds, milk quality concerns, high cost of production, inefficiencies along the value chain and inadequate legal and regulatory frameworks has been growing in demand with the increase of the population.
Tadesse Guta director of Dairy at EMDIDI told Capital that new legal a framework will enhance order in the industry as well as inspire more growth.
“So far we don’t have a framework to lead the industry which is a big challenge for us. To get quality products and grow the sector regulation with teeth is needed so we are working toward this aim.”
“We have millions of cows but the average yield per day from them is not more than 1.2 litters and the absence of new grazing fields, unorganized feeding systems are hindering dairy so we need to work on this.”
Ethiopia holds a large potential for dairy development due to its large livestock population, which comprises an estimated 59.5 million cattle, 30.70 million sheep, and 30.20 million goats.
The country produces about 4 billion liters of milk per year. Per capita consumption is very low, estimated at about 20 liters, though rising consumption levels in Addis Ababa have brought it to about 40 liters.
The Food and Agriculture Organization recommends that the per capita consumption of milk be about 200 liters, meaning 22 billion liters of milk is required. At the current production rate, there’s an annual shortage of about 18 billion liters.
INFLATION & INSTABILITY
Inflation is one of the subtler culprits of the prevailing world order. Currently, inflationary condition is more pronounced in the poorer countries of the global system than anywhere else. This is because aspiring countries still have a long way to go in their ‘catching up’ project. On the other hand, because of demographic conditions and demand saturation, the core countries of the system are continuously threatened by deflation, at least at the macro level. At the grass root level however, rising living expenses (establishment figures aside) keep on decimating the sheeple’s (human mass) standard of living in the rich countries. Unfortunately, modern states, instead of protecting their citizens from inflation, have become the very source of the problem! There are two main reasons why inflation is encouraged by the world system.
One is; the existing interstate system depends on phony money for its very existence. Phony money, money not earned, but printed, is the source of real inflation. In the words of the ‘father of the 20th century monetarists’: ‘Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon and in the sense that it is and can be produced only by a more rapid increase in the quantity of money than output.’ Milton Friedman. The parasitic elites of the world system reckon; earned money (in an honest segment of the economy) is for suckers; the working stiff, the ‘salary man’, petty traders, etc., Printed money, they surmise, is for them and their partners in crime. This rent seeking group includes all those actors, economic or otherwise, whose claim to wealth is primarily the money spigot, profusely channeled either via state agencies or market operators! By and large, it is this ephemeral wealth what everybody and his uncle are talking about all over the world today. The oft talked about global economic growth is (unsustainable and polarizing) to a large extent, the outcome of the phony money system.
Even those once productive entrepreneurs and corporations have succumbed to the perverted logic of phony money. If truth be told, without creating money out of thin air, the fixation on growth cannot be sustained. When the going gets tough, it is the states that back the superfluous wealth that has been created by phony money. See Bonner’s article next column. As it stands, stock markets are being owned, increasingly, by central banks-the real heavy weights behind the printing press of phony money. For example, the Bank of Japan is now the largest shareholder, by far, in each of the major corporations of the Japanese state. The central bank of Switzerland owns billions of US dollars worth of shares in the major western corporations, Apple, Microsoft, Netflix, Facebook, Amazon, etc.! The EU has instituted a policy of buying shares of European corporations (not always strategic and large) that are not making the cut, so to speak. Why work hard when states are always there to bailout, not only financial institutions like banks, but also run-of-the-mill companies (usually connected to the power that be) in the equity market!
The second reason the global status quo likes inflation is; governments need to inflate their currencies in order to service their debts and pay principals. Inflation also helps hoodwink the gullible, by making them think they have more money than ever. The extreme case is when everybody becomes (or used to be until recently) a millionaire if not a cool billionaire; like in Zimbabwe and the Weimar Republic (1920/30s) of Germany. Eroding purchasing power on a continuous basis is what triggers outrage and insurrections in many a society. Inflation is also an ideology of sort. It has a tendency to keep the sheeple on the running mill, without allowing it to critically examine why it should be so. Due cognizance of such rampant inflation is the main reason why collective humanity is forced to join the rat race. The world’s population, almost without exception, remains fixated on the fear of inflation. From doctors to peasants, from scientists to janitors, from preachers to peddlers, etc., are all systemically defocused, thanks to inflation. Obsessive focus on the day-to-day grinding, to make ends meet, is what inflation doses to the global sheeple. As a result, critical thinking and sober reflections ended up in the domain of the privileged and the seriously rich. Between inflation and indoctrination, the global sheeple has been rendered impotent. How else can one justify the dormant behavior of global humanity when the very life support systems are being systemically destroyed by the greed regime?
Critical souls who remain relatively independent and sorely feel the need for a more just and sustainable world order have become determined to derail the shallow neoliberal globalization of our time! To this end, various projects are in the offing. The various new currencies/crypto-currencies belong to these initiatives. The time proven currency of precious metals is also making a comeback. The fiat money system, without any backing, has been undermining gold for decades. Replacing the fiat currency regime that is pointedly making the working stiff poor and the lumpen bourgeoisie rich, while undermining the natural world, should be given the utmost priority! Currently many countries of the world want to horde the old glittering relic, to paraphrase the canny rhetoric of the establishment. Here are some commentaries on the nature of inflation, from hardcore supporters of the global order.
‘Inflation is as violent as a mugger, as frightening as an armed robber and as deadly as a hit man.’ Ronald Reagan. ‘Inflation is the parent of unemployment and the unseen robber of those who have saved.’ Margaret Thatcher. “By a continuing process of inflation, government can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens.” John Maynard Keynes. Good Day!
Land reforms – Keeping a 21st century Ethiopia in mind
I am one of those who believe that responsible ownership enhances economic performance. I believe that the assignment of property rights is an important step in promoting a higher standard of living for any country’s citizenry. I also believe that government has to do much more than a pure laissez faire approach would allow for expanding ownership in general.
Land policy in Ethiopia, for example, is one area that needs revisiting as current land laws fail to provide incentives for developing land and increasing production of agricultural commodities.
Ethiopians have a deep notion, rooted in their feelings and their minds, that land is everything. They are so attached to the little plot of land they own as a community member, they worry of any policy that would alter the current system, even if the latter works far better.
Here is one good challenge for the government – to work on reforms that will allow the ownership of hundred of thousands of farmland and urban land to Ethiopians.
Why?
Three reasons:
First, the current system has failed to provide incentives for developing land and increasing production of agricultural commodities. Caution however, is in order not to foster more corruption or entice new oligarchs.
Second, land reform if properly carried out, would widen the opportunities for social and occupational mobility, and facilitate efficiency gains by reallocating land to more efficient users via land markets.
Third, secure tenure rights can boost long-term land-related investment through assurances that returns on investment will not be appropriated.
There are of course other reasons.
Still, Ethiopia should not privatize everything, and it should not distribute property to everybody. The government should still reserve the right to regain the ownership to the land in the event of waste. This system allows the state to designate the use of land for specific purposes pursuant to public policy, while also giving the owners a broad system of powers to possess, use, manage and control the land. The government must maintain the discretion to choose which land to privatize and who will receive it, thereby limiting the scope of privatization.
Assuming the new government can muster the necessary political will for actual implementation of land reforms, such initiative works only if there is a much larger and comprehensive package of agrarian reforms, if there is renewed public investment in agriculture focusing on reviving sustainable technologies for smallholding rain-fed farming, income protection and support to farmers and rural credit, among other measures. Unfortunately there is no sign whatsoever of any such public priority with the current administration.
Privatization is an inherently controversial issue that will generate considerable public and political debate. And yes much thinking in reenergizing the economy is in order, Standing Committee reports and public debates are a must. The PM will need to take decisions on these.
Current economic changes, political instability, absence of clear legal doctrines and regulations, corruption and bureaucracy demand implementation of a clear and coherent policy.
As I pointed out government must control the land allocation process and designate the subsequent use of the land. It should play an administrative role in this process. Before any privatization can occur however, a complete legislative package must be introduced or overhauled, covering banking law, commercial law, bankruptcy law, real estate finance law, tax law, labor law, and administrative law. Furthermore, the law regarding ownership of property must be revised before privatization is launched.
In this day and age, economic governance demands flexible laws that cannot only guarantee an owner sufficient powers to effectively realize his interest in the property, but also give society the legal means to control the distribution of this power according to general principles of fairness, equity, and the public interest.
Dear Reader, this is the first out of the six reforms I believe should be considered by the new administration. Five to go!
