Assessing the Ten Years Perspective Development Plan of the FDRE Government - Foundation Office Ethiopia / African Union
Workshop
Details
A few months back, the KAS Office Ethiopia/AU and its partner, the Ethiopian Chamber of Commerce and Sectorial Associations (ECCSA), took on assessing the Ethiopian Government’s new Ten-Year Perspective Development Plan, short the “TYPDP”. After taking office, the new Ethiopian Government had put a special emphasis on privatizing state-owned companies and supporting the private sector in general in order to achieve its goal to become a middle-income country in the near future. Among other things, it launched in 2019 an initiative for “Improving Ease of Doing Business” in Ethiopia.
KAS and ECCSA therefore wanted to take a closer look at the provisions the FDRE Government included in the “TYPDP” as support mechanism for the private sector. Those could be capital, loans, and other public means for the ease of doing business and improving conditions for local and international businesses who want to operate in Ethiopia. The study was conducted by Dr. Simeneh Bassie and his team from the Ethiopian Economic Association (EEA).
In mid-June, at a half-day workshop in Addis Ababa organized by KAS and ECCSA, the researchers presented the study which first contextualized the TYPDP historically and then assessed different provisions, strengths, and weaknesses of the plan.
Overall, the researchers highlighted the important fact that the new plan explicitly mentions the support of the private sector as a goal and condition for Ethiopia’s future growth. The study also identified major challenges and impediments to the successful implementation of the plan, such as lack of capital, banking regulations, and lack of training of economists. It is to note that Ethiopia’s private sector is fairly new and represents small- and medium-sized enterprises in the large majority.
In their comments, Ethiopian entrepreneurs and representatives of different government ministries welcomed the event, but also hoped for closer assessments of different sectors in order to better identify and cater to the different needs of entrepreneurs. While the majority agreed that the overall business environment in Ethiopia remains difficult through simultaneous external shocks, participants highlighted the importance of improving doing business in Ethiopia and the need for more support from the government.
