Industrial Parks Development Corporation said a right of way is challenging industrial parks and their operation. As the corporation said mostly city administrations are not available to fulfill their responsibilities in protecting boundary of industrial parks.
Behaylu Kebede, Marketing and Communication head of the corporation told Capital that even if the corporation is trying to have different dialogues with city administrations to solve the problems there is no concrete result on the issue, and some of the cases have been taken to the court. ICT, Bole lemi, Dire Dawa, and Adama industrial parks are some which are suffering by the cases.
As Behaylu said the case of right of way is limiting investors from building internationally qualified industries, and in some cases there has been also interruptions of operations in the industrial parks due to security issues as a result of right of way cases. The corporation is also closely working with the society to solve the problem and also in creating awareness as the parks is important for the society.
Beside right of way, Behaylu said the city administrations are not cooperating with the corporation in building basic infrastructure around industrial parks, which is making it harder in the operation of the parks.
Furthermore, the corporation has said in its program that in order to build housing for employees based in industrial parks is not receiving full support from the city administrations as it was planned. “The corporation wants the city administrations to consider industrial park employees in their housing scheme programs, whereas most of the administrations are not willing to do so,” it expressed.
The corporation said that in order to solve the housing problem that employees are facing and to increase efficiency of their production there are three options, that is: by facilitating bank loan for those who have land around industrial parks and build houses that can be affordable for employees, secondly, by giving land for the investors to build dorm kind of houses for their workers and lastly by working with private developers.
Recently, the Corporation had inked an agreement with Corner-Stone Housing Development Group to build housing for its employees based in Hawassa Industrial Park.
Housing shortage is regularly cited as one of the main constraints of work force recruitment and retention in the IPs. The Industrial Parks Development Corporation (IPDC) and Ethiopian Investment Commission (EIC) have initiated various initiatives to tackle this affordable housing shortage for IP workers.
Currently, there are more than 83,700 employees working at 13 industrial parks, and in 2020/21 budget year the industrial parks have created job for 56,236 employees.
In the 2020/21 completed budget year, the corporation had raised 247.9 million dollar revenue from the planned 400 million dollar, and as the corporation said, slowdown in export as result of Covid-19, and the complete closure of Mekelle industrial park during the law enforcement had raised as some difficulties in the budget year.
The public enterprise, manages 13 industrial parks including: Mekelle, Semera, Bahir-Dar, Kombolcha, Debre Birhan, Dire Dawa, Kilinto, Bole lemi, Adama, Jimma, and Hawassa industrial parks
In the coming 20 years the corporation is planning to increase the number of industrial parks to 100, however, the corporation has no plans to build new parks for the 2021/22 budget year.
Industrial parks face hindrance from right of way and cooperation
UNCTAD, IATA extend partnership to facilitate global trade
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) and UNCTAD announced that they have extended their partnership. The move comes in an effort to facilitate international trade, particularly e-commerce.
Both parties aim to enrich their history of collaboration with each other to accomplish various shared goals. This includes the successful integration of air cargo messaging standards (Cargo-XML) into UNCTAD’s automated customs management system, ASYCUDAWorld. The integration is expected to enable a more efficient processing of air cargo shipments for the 100 countries choosing to deploy the latest version of ASYCUDAWorld.
“Through this extended partnership, we look forward to leveraging the leadership of UNCTAD and IATA in their respective fields to boost e-commerce in developing countries through improved exchanges of trade data,” said Shamika N. Sirimanne UNCTAD’s Technology and Logistics Director.
The next stage of the collaboration is expected to include adding a risk assessment for mail shipments and facilitating access to the IATA enhanced partner identification and connectivity. This will enable ASYCUDAWorld to manage e-commerce shipments more efficiently.
Once completed, ASYCUDAWorld will allow customs authorities to communicate advanced cargo/mail information requirements across the digitized supply chain including airlines, freight forwarders, ground handlers and third-party messaging service providers.
“Global standards enable accurate information and effective risk-assessments. This in turn promotes stronger compliance and will contribute to a safe supply chain, which should give the authorities the confidence to modernize processes,” said Nick Careen, IATA’s Senior Vice President for Operations, Safety and Security.
The collaboration will also include the potential exchange of additional operational electronic information such as air cargo rules, flight schedules and others that can assist customs officials in their risk assessments.
42.2% of Addis Ababa dwellers are migrants, survey reveals
A new survey reveals that 42.2 percent of the total population in Addis Ababa are migrants. The survey was done by the Government of Ethiopia, the Central Statistics Agency (CSA) with support from the International Organization of Migration in all regions and city administrations except Tigray region.
According to the survey in the country, 17.1 percent of the population was internal migrants where the female population was recorded to migrate more than males. Additionally, two third of the internal migrants were aged in the 15-39 bracket.
Following Addis Ababa, 31.7 percent of the total population of Gambela region is also regarded as migrants.
The highest form of internal migration in Ethiopia is migration from rural to urban accounting to 32.2 percent. About two thirds of the total migrants aged ten years and above were employed in various economic activities.
According to the survey, Ethiopians living abroad is estimated to be 839,224 excluding Tigray region according to the information obtained from the households. Showing that most emigrants are between 15-29 years of which more than 54 percent of them are male.
The highest number of emigrants is originated from Oromia, Amhara and SNNP regions. The survey revealed that 51,089 Ethiopian emigrants are missing migrants since “many migrants lack proper document while crossing international boarders,” the report revealed.
The survey has covered the entire sedentary as well as pastoralist areas of the country except the Tigray region with all urban and rural households in the country being targeted in the survey.
Ethiopia as being one of the fastest populations growing in African countries notes that coping with a developing economy, proper management and efficient utilization of its work force as essential.
The survey reveals that in February 2021 the total population of the country excluding Tigray region and non-conventional households are estimated to be 98,038,146 of which 69,964,475 of the population is aged ten years and above.
The economically inactive persons who are neither engaged in productive activities nor available to furnish their labor due to homemaking activities, attending schools old age, illness, too young to work accounts for 24.7 million according to the survey, with the proportion of females being higher than males.( Where 61.5 percent were female and 38.5 percent being male).
About 65 percent of the total population is active to participate in production of goods and services. However the figure shows decline compared to the rates observed in June 2013 as the survey stated.
According to the survey, about 60 percent of the total population aged ten years and above are employed. With regards to regions, Benshangul-Gumuz region shows the highest employment to population ration while Somali demonstrate the lowest ratio.
As the report said, majority of the employed persons were self-employed and yet 37 percent were noted as unpaid family workers and the share of government employees accounted for 6 percent at national level.
At the national level, about 65 percent of the employed persons are working in the agriculture sector, the service sector, including public administration, defense compulsory social security, education, health, while other social activities and house activities accounts for 24 percent as wholesale and retail trades accounted for 5.9 percent.
According to the survey, the mean amount of total payment per month for paid employee at country level is 4,127 birr. To this regard, males obtained higher monthly payment of 4,556 birr and females 3,363 birr per month.
The survey result reveals that unemployed people in the country accounted for 8 percent of the total population where 3.6 million peoples are unemployed based on the definition of International Labor Organization (ILO). The rate of unemployment in urban areas is 17.9 percent where Addis Ababa city administration has recorded the highest unemployment rate followed by Dire Dawa. The lowest unemployment rate yet is as recorded in Benishangul-Gumuz region.
Centre for African Leaders in Agriculture launches inaugural Leadership Programme
With Africa’s food security and sustainability playing a central role in the continent’s economic growth and adaptation to climate change, the Centre for African Leaders in Agriculture (CALA), an initiative led by the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), officially launched its first cohort of 80 leaders from eight focus countries across sub-Saharan Africa. To support agriculture leaders deliver on policy priorities across the continent, this week CALA’s inaugural Advanced Leadership Programme: Collaborative Leadership for Africa’s Food Security and Sustainability kicked off with individuals from government, the private sector and civil society from Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Nigeria, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda.
CALA has been established with funding from the German Development Cooperation (GIZ) through the KfW Development Bank and led by AGRA in collaboration with the African Management Institute (AMI), the Centre’s lead implementer and learning partner, and USAID’s Policy LINK, which has led the design and rollout of the leadership programme’s coaching component. The first cohort of 80 leaders from across government, the private sector, and civil society were selected from nearly 1,000 applicants. An application process for the programme’s second cohort will open in early 2022.
CALA’s first three-day Leadership Forum held virtually, began this past Monday with live remarks from AGRA’s Board Chair and former Prime Minister of Ethiopia, H.E. Hailemariam Dessalegn, AGRA’s President Dr. Agnes Kalibata, AMI’s CEO Rebecca Harrison and USAID Policy LINK’s Regional Director Robert Ouma.
“The complexity of agriculture transformation requires collaborative and coordinated effort amongst all stakeholders, and that is why these kinds of initiatives (like CALA) are important,” noted AGRA’s Board Chair, Hailemariam Dessalegn in his remarks.
AGRA President, Dr. Agnes Kalibata added, “To move steadily towards an inclusive Agriculture Transformation in Africa, we need strong networks of leaders who can learn together and from one another on how to advance our food systems in a way that is inclusive, equitable, sustainable and climate sensitive. CALA is an opportunity to bring agriculture leaders together to share knowledge across government, private sector and civil society, to support the implementation of agriculture sector priorities and hone leadership skills with the aim of enhancing the delivery of our commitments for the sector to contribute to ending hunger and malnutrition, poverty and improving livelihoods.”
The 16-month Advanced Leadership Programme learning journey is designed for established and emerging sector leaders spearheading priority country-level agriculture strategies to effect change. The programme focuses on developing the competencies of leaders in four core interrelated dimensions, including management skills for improved implementation, honing of leadership skills, institutional development and over time, systems change where leaders can effect change on a broader scale. The programme will also profile environmental sustainability practices which contribute to sustainable farming, food production, and resilient food systems in the face of increasing climate change impacts.
“For transformation, we know that it is collaborative leadership that will unlock results and progress for the continent in terms of food security and sustainability. Without strong and collaborative leadership, good ideas go unrealised, plans stagnate, and ultimately the opportunity for transformation can slip away,” said AMI CEO and Co-Founder, Rebecca Harrison.
“Good leadership is a factor of production, and in Africa, we need good, inspired leadership to transform our agricultural sector through motivation and influence,” said Policy LINK Regional Director Robert Ouma. “To support them in their learning and growth as leaders of their countries’ agricultural transformation, CALA’s leadership coaching will draw upon successful models of executive and team coaching.”
