Yoniii,

Do you like Ribbs?......I do :)

I love almost anything that has to do with meat. :)

Very interesting talk the Ethiopian PM had with the Ethiopian inverters; it shows both the government and the Ethiopian investors lack truest between them. And the PM is pleading with the investors to work with the government in order to stabiles the rising of food price and other substances.

PM Meles Zenawi talks with Ethiopian Investors in Addis Ababa - Part 1
http://www.ethiotube.net/video/14106/PM-Meles-Zenawi-talks-with-Ethiopian-Investors-in-Addis-Ababa--Part-1

PM Meles Zenawi talks with Ethiopian Investors in Addis Ababa - Part 2
http://www.ethiotube.net/video/14107/PM-Meles-Zenawi-talks-with-Ethiopian-Investors-in-Addis-Ababa--Part-2

I love almost anything that has to do with meat. :)
^^
Shifta...:lol:

Very interesting talk the Ethiopian PM had with the Ethiopian inverters; it shows both the government and the Ethiopian investors lack truest between them. And the PM is pleading with the investors to work with the government in order to stabiles the rising of food price and other substances. [/URL]

They (investors) just don't get it - bunch of idiots. They do everything (including cheating) when they are investing in Real Estate & service rather than investing in Agriculture / manufacturing / agro industry......opening a Hotel with no meat / egg / bread it just doesn't make sense........but, they are (including the public) quick to complain if an investor from outside is investing in Agriculture. I say, let the Indians come in to show & to give some lesson to that lazy azz.....

Some US$6 billion budget has been endored by Ethiopia's council of ministers for the 2011/2012 fiscal year. It is the Horn of Africa country's biggest budget endorsement on record.


80 percent of some US$ 2 billion allotted for capital budget projects are expected to go into infrastructure development (mainly roads), social services (including education and health), agriculture and water development.
Map of Ethiopia

Map of Ethiopia

The remaining will be used to support the nine regional states of the country during the fiscal year, between July 8, 2011 and June 23, 2012.

According to the Ethiopian council of ministers, who endorsed the budget after reviewing the current political and economic situation of the country, this year's budget exceeds last year's by around US$ 2 billion.

“The budget increase was made due to the current economic growth of the country,” said Abraham Tekeste, Ethiopia’s minister of Finance and Economic Development.

The Ethiopian Ministry of Finance and Economic Development has also announced that about US$ 3.6 billion of the total budget will be sourced from local resources while the remaining will be mobilized in the form of loans and grants from Ethiopia’s development partners.

Over US$1 billion of the money will come from grants, while the country's development partners will provide some US$ 850 billion.

Ethiopia has, for the first time, allocated over $ 750 million to support the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The MDGs aim to slash extreme poverty and hunger by half by 2015.


http://www.theafricareport.com/archives2/business/5141470-ethiopia-endorses-us-6-billion-budget-for-20112012.html

Largest cotton farm in Tigray region brings land holdings to 7400ht(16,280 acre)
Addisfortune.com


Last Updated 06/13/2011


Largest Cotton Farm in Tigray Brings Land Holdings to 7,400ht

Almicom aims to increase national cotton production to ease shortage faced by local textile producers



The largest cotton plantation owner in Tigray Regional State, Almicom Agricultural Development, added 2,000ht to the land it holds on Thursday, June 9, 2011, to increase cotton production and ease the shortage faced by local textile factories.

Due to the shortage, the government placed a prohibition on the export of raw cotton in September 2010. In 2010, Ethiopia imported around 12tn of cotton. Cotton production stood at 21,000tn over the past 10 months, an amount the government plans to increase to 98,000tn by the end of 2014/15.

The latest addition to Almicom’s land holding is located in Hewane Wereda of Tigray Regional State’s southern zone, which is known for its underground water reserves made accessible through hand dug wells. The land was leased from the regional government on a 25-year basis at an annual cost of 100 Br for a hectare.

Almicom, a subsidiary of Kebire Enterprises, which was established in April 2001, leased 5,400ht in Kafta Humera Wereda, located around 75km from Humera Town, in the western zone of Tigray Regional State, in 2009.

The zone is close to the Kaza River, making it well suited for the irrigation project the company plans.

Out of the total, Almicom planted 3,000ht in June 2010, from which it harvested 33,000ql in October.

“We only planted on a fraction of the land because it was a trial and because we faced a shortage in cotton seeds and pesticide,” Tesfaye Belay, farm manager of Almicom, told Fortune.

Almicom, which was established in 2009 with 110 million Br in capital, supplies cotton to factories, including MAA Garment Factory, its sister company.

“MAA Garment Factory has been transitioning to include textile manufacturing,” said Fikreselassie Ambaw, general manager of the factory. “It has a spinning mill factory, a knitting factory, as well as dying and finishing facilities. The expansion helped it increase its annual exports from 500,000 dollars to nine million dollars.”

MAA, which exports around 90pc of its total annual production, is the second largest exporter of textiles and garments of the more than 70 factories nationwide.

It earned 3.4 million dollars in revenue over the past nine months, while Ayka Addis Textile & Investment Group earned 23.3 million dollars, according to the Textile Industry Development Institute (TIDI). They are followed by Almeda Textile and Adama Yarn which earned 1.9 million dollars and 1.2 million dollars, respectively, according to the institute.

The government’s GTP envisions textile and garment exports to reach one billion dollars by the end of 2014/15.

As part of its transition, MAA has been spinning and knitting cotton for the past 18 months and plans to start weaving, which improves the quality of the fabric, in two years, according to Fikreselassie.

However, the harvest yielded during Almicom’s trial period produced only an average of 11ql on a hectare, causing the factory to start looking for first class quality cotton seed varieties that can yield up to 35ql on a hectare, according to Tesfaye.

As the recently received 2,000ht of land still needs clearing, Amicom is only planting the 5,400ht in Humera this month. June, the beginning of rainy season, is the plating season for the cotton plant after which it takes about four months to ripen.

There is more than 114,000ht of arable land in Humera Wereda, but only 112,600ht have been leased for agricultural development, claimed an official at the regional land management and usage agency.

Amicom originally requested to lease a total of 9,400ht and expects to receive the remaining 2,000ht after the irrigation project in Humera come online and the factory completes its shift to textile production, according to Tesfaye.

By AMANUEL ASMELASH
FORTUNE STAFF WRITER

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/07/food-ark/siebert-text/1
.......
.......
Ethiopia's east central highlands were once one of most botanically diverse spots on Earth, but by the 1970s farmers here were down to growing just teff and a few varieties of wheat distributed to them for its high-yield potential. Today the region has been transformed: Local varieties of legumes and wheat are thriving again. Given the common depiction of Ethiopia as famine prone, it is startling to drive an hour northeast of Addis Ababa and see ample fields of a bushy, purple-seeded durum wheat, a variety found only in Ethiopia that is thriving across the country. Used for pasta, durum is largely resistant to stem rust. In one field is another local variety native to Ethiopia known as setakuri, which translates as "pride of women," because it makes the sweetest bread. It is doing even better against stem rust.

http://img39.imageshack.us/img39/2015/ngfa0711b.jpg

Ethiopia's turnaround can be traced in part to the efforts of renowned plant geneticist Melaku Worede, who received his Ph.D. from the University of Nebraska in 1972, then returned to Ethiopia with the goal of preserving—and rebuilding—the country's rich biodiversity. Training a new generation of plant breeders and geneticists, Worede and his staff at the Plant Genetic Resources Centre in Addis Ababa set about collecting and storing native plants and seeds, known as landraces, from across the country. In 1989 Worede initiated the Seeds of Survival program, a network of community seed banks that save and redistribute the seeds of local farmers.

http://img600.imageshack.us/img600/9786/ngfa0711a.jpg

Worede is hopeful that new efforts to increase food production—such as the Gates Foundation's Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa—will not repeat the mistakes of the past. Attempts are being made to include local farmers in decision-making. "The people planning this are aware that the first green revolution failed over time. There are some intelligent ideas," Worede says. "But they are still placing too much emphasis on a narrow range of varieties. What about the rest? We'll lose them. Believe me, I'm not against science. Why would I be? I'm a scientist. But contextualize it. Combine science with the local knowledge, the farmer's science."

Worede believes it is crucial to preserve the region's diversity not just in seed banks but on the ground and in close consultation with local farmers. Although yield is obviously important to farmers, even more crucial is hedging their bets against famine, spreading the risk by growing many crops, over many seasons, in many locations. In this way if one crop gets diseased, or one harvest succumbs to drought, or one hillside is flooded, they have alternatives to fall back on.

The challenge has been to show it's possible to increase productivity without sacrificing diversity. Worede wanted to prove that deciding between having enough to eat today and preserving food biodiversity for tomorrow is a false choice. And he has done precisely that. He has taken the varieties farmers selected for their adaptability and determined which of them promise the best yield. The use of high-yielding local seeds—in combination with natural fertilizers and techniques such as intercropping—has improved yield as much as 15 percent above that of the imported, high-input varieties. A parallel effort is under way with local indigenous livestock breeds. Keith Hammond, a UN expert on animal genetics, says that in 80 percent of the world's rural areas the locally adapted genetic resources are superior to imported breeds.

Still, a 15 percent increase is far from the doubling of our food supply experts say we'll need in future decades. Preserving food diversity is only one of many strategies we'll need to meet that challenge, but it is a crucial one. As the world warms, and the environment becomes less hospitable to the breeds and seeds we now rely on for food, humanity will likely need the genes that allow plants and animals to flourish in, say, the African heat or in the face of recurring blight. Indeed, Worede thinks scientists may well find the Ug99-resistant varieties they're looking for in Ethiopia's fields. "Even if the disease mutates into a new form, it will not wipe out everything here. That is the advantage of diversity."

Yet Worede balks at the idea of the developed world treating Vavilov centers like Ethiopia as wild seed banks from which to withdraw traits whenever the next plague strikes. He cites the outbreak in the early 1970s of yellow dwarf virus, which threatened to wipe out the world's barley crop. A U.S. scientist who had come to Ethiopia in the 1960s had happened to grab some barley samples from a field for his own study. When the virus hit, he handed over the samples to one of the scientists trying to stop the virus. Sure enough they found a resistant gene. "It changed everything," says Worede, "at no cost to them. No genetic engineering, nothing. Just a natural source of resistance taken from the very part of Ethiopia where people were suffering from starvation."

Mohammed and his neighbor stood in silence above their own private earthen seed bank that afternoon in Welo. Since the famine of 1984, they don't even think of selling any grain until they know what the harvest has brought. I asked whether the bounty I'd seen in their fields had them feeling a bit more secure and optimistic.

"It will be nice to have some extra money," Mohammed began, "so we can send our kids to school in good clothes, but …" He paused, looking over at his neighbor, then gave an answer I've come to think might perfectly describe the attitude we all should adopt when it comes to securing our future food supply.

"We're positive," Mohammed said. "But we're very sensitive to risk."

http://www.addisfortune.com/news_radar.htm

http://www.addisfortune.com/Vol_12_No_585_Images/radar_rising_agri.jpg

Gebisa Ejeta (left), director of Purdue University’s Institute of Food Security, and the 2009 World Food Prize Laureate, addresses a crowd of experts and government representatives while Donald Booth, US ambassador to Ethiopia (centre), and Seleshi Getahun, state minister of the Ministry of Agriculture (MoA), listen. The three individuals spoke at a seminar focusing on “Capacity Development for Agricultural Transformation and Food Security in Ethiopia,” a dialogue meant to examine methods to make tertiary education more responsive to the new Agricultural Growth Plan. The forum took place on Tuesday, July 12, 2011, at Jupiter Hotel.

Good man :cheers:

Ethiopia coffee exports hit record high

ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) - Ethiopia earned a record $841.6 million from the export of nearly 200,000 tonnes of coffee in 2010/2011, trade data showed on Wednesday, thanks to lower output from traditional giants Colombia and Brazil and higher demand from India and China.

Africa's biggest coffee producer intends to boost its agricultural output by 2015, raising coffee to 700,000 tonnes from 300,000 tonnes, under a five-year economic development plan launched last year.

High global commodity prices and the introduction in 2008 of a commodity exchange market, which promoted transparent trading instead of a murky auction system, helped lift coffee production to 196,118 tonnes in the 2010/2011 fiscal year, exporters said.

Trade data from the Ethiopian Coffee Exporters Association said the revenue figure represented a 59 percent rise compared to revenue earned in 2009/2010 and 124 percent from 2008/2009.

"The price has doubled over the year and farmers have reaped their fruit. Everyone was encouraged to bring coffee to the local market," said Hailu Gebrehiwot, an exporter and former head of the Ethiopian Coffee Exporters Association.

Prices for Ethiopia's specialty Sidamo beans reached 1,500 Ethiopian birr for 17-kilograms in 2010/2011, up from 600 birr last year, Hailu added.

The Ethiopian Commodity Exchange, which trades coffee, maize, sesame and white pea beans through an open outcry system, has said it was looking to introduce future and forward trading in a country where hoarding is common among traders wary of price volatility.

Coffee traders in Ethiopia have repeatedly held on to their stocks, reluctant to sell through the new exchange saying prices were too low, sparking authorities to warn of seizures.

The government seized 17,000 tonnes of the crop in 2009 and revoked the licences of six exporters it accused of hoarding their stocks and waiting for prices to rise.

"With the Ethiopian Commodity Exchange (ECX), the flow of coffee trading is streamlined - it means there's less contraband business going on," Hailu told Reuters.

Ethiopia prides itself as the birthplace of coffee. Some 15 million smallholder farmers grow the crop, mostly in the forested highlands in the huge country's west and southwest.

The Horn of Africa nation projects it will earn $3 billion in export revenue for 2010/11 (July-June) after a resurgence of coffee sales and diversification into new commodities earned $2 billion in the previous year.http://af.reuters.com/article/investingNews/idAFJOE76Q0HX20110727?sp=true

A massive increase on previous years.

Wake me up when sales go above a billion and Ethiopia produces over 500,000 metric tons.

EDIT: Wait, the FAO says (http://faostat.fao.org/site/567/DesktopDefault.aspx?PageID=567#ancor) production was 325,800 metric tons in 2007? :?

Ethiopia presses with Nile projects despite Egypt’s opposition
Ethiopia has launched its biggest ever irrigation project over the Nile River after receiving US$100 million from the World Bank. The project is going ahead despite disapproval from Egypt, which is against such activities along the Nile.

It will become Ethiopia’s biggest water project along the Nile alongside the Great Renaissance Dam hydro power dam project.

Construction of the Renaissance Dam, which will boost Ethiopia’s electricity exports in the region, sparked a diplomatic row with Egypt over the use of the Nile’s water.


Hayalsew Yilma, the programme coordinator in the Ethiopian ministry of Water and Energy on Tuesday said a feasibility study and detailed design works for the Megech-Seraba and Ribb irrigation project were now complete.


The project is expected to 100,000 hectares of land in the Horn of Africa country's Nile Basin.



The World Bank approved a loan of US$ 100 million in 2008 to help the country increase its agricultural productivity, accelerate growth and reduce rural poverty.

About 20,000 hectares of land will be put under irrigation with water from Lake Tana, Ethiopia's largest lake, and the Ribb River.

The country also aims to irrigate another 20,000 hectares of land to boost agricultural production by subsistence farmers, in northwestern Ethiopia, in order to enable them sell to surplus crops.


Studies are currently being conducted for an additional 97,000 hectares of land to be put under irrigation.

Lake Tana is the biggest source of water for the Nile River, which runs through nine African countries


Egypt's disapproval


Meanwhile, Egypt has expressed its concern on all projects that seek to use the Nile River arguing that colonial-era agreements with the British signed in the 1920s and 1950s still stand.


But analysts say Egypt has changed its tone, choosing to negotiate, since Ethiopia launched Africa’s biggest dam over the Nile River.


The Renaissance hydro-electric project will generate around 5,250 MW of power by 2015.


Egypt and Ethiopia have held high level discussions on the use of the Nile River over the past couple of months during which Ethiopia has, reportedly, sought to assure its northern neighbour that none of the projects over the Nile will negatively impact the Nile Basin countries.


But Egypt says it will closely monitor the projects.


Nile Basin countries

Ethiopia and other riparian countries that form part of the Nile Basin, with the exception of Egypt and Sudan, are pushing for equity sharing of the river.


Burundi, Uganda, Rwanda, Tanzania, Ethiopia and Kenya, last year signed a cooperative framework agreement for an equitable use of the river and strip Egypt and Sudan of their veto rights.


For several decades, Egypt held veto rights over all upstream projects using powers granted by a 1929 colonial-era treaty with Britain.


A latter deal between Egypt and Sudan in 1959 gave the two downstream countries more than 90 percent control of the Nile.

Ethiopia's decision to undertake development projects on the Nile was encouraged by the cooperative framework agreement which was signed by a majority of the Nile Basin countries.


South Sudan


The Ethiopian government has also held discussions with the newly independent state of South Sudan seeking its approval for the projects.


Although South Sudan has been non committal on the matter, it is likely to support Ethiopia’s stance because of the strong ties that now exist between the two countries.


In the meantime, Hayalsew has announced that Ethiopia is "looking to hire a contractor to start the project implementation phase” of the irrigation project.

Feasibility studies for Megech-Robit, Negeso and Upper Beles irrigation projects to develop an additional 80,000 hectares of land have also been finalised.

There were reports that the irrigation projects will increase the country’s agricultural productivity six fold and ensure its sustainable economic growth.

In addition to the World Bank loan, government has allocated some US$10 million for the irrigation projects.

Ethiopia recently launched a five-year growth and transformation plan that aims to multiply irrigated land by five to about 10,000 hectares by mid-2015.

As much as 2.2 million hectares of Ethiopia’s 3.7 million hectares of irrigable land is in the Nile Basin, according to a study by the Horn of Africa country's government.http://www.theafricareport.com/archives2/society-a-culture/5168342-ethiopia-presses-with-nile-projects-despite-egypts-opposition.html

Ambo Gnemer Agro & Integrated Industries - Making citizens become investors

Prominent personalities mostly from Ambo have established a company--Ambo Gnemer Agro & Integrated Industries—which weeks ago secured the vastest arable land (128,000 ha) so far taken by a single local company in the country. This has made the company, whose projects has yet to materialized, join the rank and file of a few foreign investors who are waiting to receive massive arable lands reaching up to 300,000 ha, six times the size of Addis, as is the case for the Indian Conglomerate, Karuturi. The founders of Ambo Gnemer Agro & Integrated S. Co. include Mitiku Tesso (Ph.D.), President of Ambo University, Dr Zewdu Zeleke, board chairman of the company, Athlete Tesfaye Tolla, Dereje Dejene, UNDP Economic Growth and Poverty reduction Head, Gizaw Teklemariam (Eng.), co-founder of Habesha Cement S.Co. and former general manager of Mugher Cement and Abera Bekele (Eng.), board member of the company.


The Reporter: You are poised to be engaged in projects set to be implemented on a vast land, in fact the largest one to be secured by a single local company so far in the country. Could you highlight the projects you will be engaged in?


Dereje: As its name indicates, our company will basically be engaged in agro businesses and integrated industries classified under five major categories: agriculture and agricultural products, cement and construction materials, mines, industries and commerce. To go into some of the details, our company will develop sugarcane plantation on a vast land and establish a huge sugar factory that can produce up to 1,000 tonnes of sugar a day. We will produce fruits and vegetables, edible oil, and other agricultural products and supply them both to the local and export market. The company will be engaged in agro industry activities and raising animals such as ostriches, chicken and fish, pack its products by itself for the export market. It will also raise live animals, including goats and sheep and establish a big slaughterhouse. It will pack animal products for the export market. The company will be engaged in coffee plantation and produce a variety of selected seeds. It will be engaged in a bee farm and produce honey both for the local and the export market. It will produce essence for the local and export market.

The company will establish various industries, including cement, marble, gypsum, textile and glass factories. It will be engaged in mining and related development activities. It will have trade houses conducing commercial and trade activities, among many other business operations.



Reporter: You said the land you have secured is so vast. Wouldn’t irrigating such a vast land be a challenging task?


Dereje: It will be a real-time challenge, but not without a real-time solution. First of all, note should be taken that we are not going to irrigate all the 128,000 ha land. All the same, we have ample resources to irrigate the farmlands we will develop by employing modern and appropriate irrigation technologies and by using the rivers that cross or borders the region, the major one big Gouder River, one of the major tributaries of Blue Nile. In fact, we might have to irrigate 25,000 to 30,000 ha land and that would not be an easy thing to do technically and financially.

Full interview is found on the link; I just quoted the parts specifically about agriculture.

http://www.ethiopianreporter.com/pre-en/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1789:making-citizens-become-investors&catid=105:interview&Itemid=518

India-based Sara Cotton to farm in Ethiopia
India-based Sara Cotton Fibers Private Limited will invest $6.4 million, has it has raised through a mix of equity and debt, in order to fund its plans, to undertake cotton farming in Ethiopia and will produce 50,000 bales of cotton. (One bale = 180 kgs), which it will be selling to leading spinning mills in India, Pakistan, China, and Sri Lanka.

Initially, Sara Cotton will cultivate cotton on around 25,000 acres and has targeted revenues of $50 million in the next 18-24 months. Over a 5-7 year period, the cotton company plans to increase the acreage to 500,000 acres.

Sara Cotton has tied up with Israel based Hazera Genetics, a leading international player with presence in 60 countries in breeding, production and marketing of innovative hybrid seeds of vegetables and field crop seeds and with US based John Deere for agricultural equipments.

It is also planning a community development program as a CSR measure by helping the local community in establishing schools & hospitals. Further it also plans to open Agroskill Development Institute (ADLI) wherein, skilled agro technicians and laborers will be given theoretical and practical training.

Fibre2fashion spoke exclusively with Mr KS Sundhar Rajan, Group Financial Controller, Sara Cotton Fibers who said, “The Ethiopian government has also recently announced cotton as a priority sector for the country and offers a very investor friendly climate for corporate. Incentives for our expansion include a three-year tax holiday, duty-free machinery imports and duty-free import of spares up to 15% of the machinery value.

http://www.fibre2fashion.com/news/textile-news/newsdetails.aspx?news_id=101814

Ambo Gnemer Agro & Integrated Industries - Making citizens become investors

Full interview is found on the link; I just quoted the parts specifically about agriculture.

http://www.ethiopianreporter.com/pre-en/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1789:making-citizens-become-investors&catid=105:interview&Itemid=518

Locals are coming in big...this, for sure, will shut up the Diaspora's "Land grab" noise. Local investors need to wake up and see left and right where the real beef is - Agriculture!

Share Company to raise capital to 100 mln birr

Timir Agro Industry Share Company plans to increase its share sales from the current 25 million birr to 100 million birr by May 2012. The company plans the sale of its shares for the various expansion projects and various business activities.

The company has acquired on July 2011, 20 hectares of land from the Amhara regional state in North Shoa Zone Hagere Mariam city near Sheno city 65 km north of Addis Ababa. The land was given by the government and is to be used by the Share Company for the building of a dairy farm and products a processing plant, an improved animal feed area for forage as well as for highland fruits and vegetables farm.

According to Gebeyehu Bekele General Manager of Timir Agro Industry Share Company, ‘We previously had requested up to 50 hectares of land with a view to compensating the area’s farmers with up to three million birr and intended to start dairy and dairy products processing plants and other related ventures. However, we had to wait more than a year for the processing of the request of land and were offered only 30 hectares with a compensation scheme of 1.7 million birr for farmers of which the Oromia administration offered us only 10 hectares for our immediate use the rest contingent on our performance. Because of this we instead choose the Amhara state’s land offer.’

He further said the new place is closer to Addis Ababa by eight kilometers than the previous one in Oromia was and it is right next to the Addis Ababa- Northern Ethiopia Asphalt highway. He added that the company has already made plans to acquire about 60 hectares of land to expand activities such as a farm for about 500 hybrid cows producing milk and milk products.

‘We have already done preliminary work on the 20 hectares of land such as planting trees to act as wind breaks and shades while also planning to start construction of the project on October,’ Gebeyehu told Capital.

The share company already has a modern dairy farm complete with trucks and machinery at a cost of about 4.6 million birr in Sendafa area near Addis Ababa. This farm has around 100 cows which were purchased on July 2010 and lies on two hectares but the company says because of its closeness to the city it cannot be expanded. The Sendafa farm has also an Apiary (bee keeping farm) which has already sold samples of unpacked honey and has plans for the further sale of unpacked honey in the future.

It is also in the process of finalizing the acquisition an area for an animal fattening and meat processing plant for export use in the Alem Tena area of East Shoa zone. Currently the area for this plant is only one hectare of land because of the scarcity of land for investment, but he says the company has a promise from the authorities to give two hectares of area.

The share company also has plans in the future for a poultry processing plant and an irrigated vegetable and fruit agro-industry.

The share company blamed its slow pace of investment on the long land acquisition process it was subjected to, the confusion and the loss of momentum it had due to a name change from Hibir Agro Industry Share Company to Timir Agro Industry Share Company and the time gap it had in advertising itself to the public by means of print and broadcast media.

The company had decided in its first founding shares conference on April 2010 to do its share selling activities side by side with its investment activities instead of selling shares first and investment activities later on.http://capitalethiopia.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=15583:share-company-to-raise-capital-to-100-mln-birr&catid=12:local-news&Itemid=4

Zablon opens oil seed, pulse processing plant in Adama


By Elias Gebreselassie
Monday, 10 October 2011 10:21

Zablon trading Private Limited Company inaugurated its cleaning plant for oilseed and pulses, costing 30 million birr and occupying a space of 10,000 square meters in Adama city, 99 kilometers south east of Addis Ababa on October 1, 2011. The company which was formed two years ago also imports Eurotrakker trucks to sell on the local market.

The plant which has created job opportunities for 50 permanent and 30 temporary workers also has two warehouses that are able to hold 140 thousand and 60 thousand quintals of oilseeds and pulses. Turkish machines at the factory can clean around 60 quintals per hour. It also has a conference hall, security room, reception center, a worker’s cafeteria, laboratory, inspection control room and fumigation center. It will clean and sort over 1,200 quintals of export quality oil seeds and pulses every year.

The company exports its sesame procured from the Gondar area mainly to Israel of up to 20,000 quintals of sesame seeds have been exported to Israel. The pulses have been exported since July 2011 to countries like China, Turkey and the US with the company claiming that it has already established contracts to supply its customers with the cleaned agricultural produce.

The company also has plans to open a plant for ferrous iron used for houses and to also promote and expand the market need for green mung beans which are mainly found in the Shoa Robit area of Ethiopia but are recently being grown in the Assosa area of western Ethiopia fetching up to one thousand birr per quintal.

read the rest at CapitalEthiopia (http://capitalethiopia.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=15581:zablon-opens-oil-seed-pulse-processing-plant-in-adama&catid=12:local-news&Itemid=4)

PepsiCo partnership to boost Ethiopian chickpeas

By Martinne Geller

PURCHASE, New York | Tue Sep 20, 2011 11:07pm EDT

(Reuters) - PepsiCo Inc, best known for its cola and Lays potato chips, is now setting its sights on chickpeas.

The company is teaming up with the U.S. Agency for International Development to boost the production of chickpeas in Ethiopia by working with small farmers.

The plan is then to help develop local businesses that use the crop -- and, at the same time, secure a supply of chickpeas for Sabra hummus, which PepsiCo owns together with Israel's Strauss Group Ltd.

And in concert with the World Food Programme, PepsiCo will also develop a chickpea-based food supplement to target malnourished children in Ethiopia. If a pilot involving a few thousand children were successful, the company would spend $1 million to buy the product and distribute it for one year to up to 40,000 children, many of whom are suffering from the effects of famine.

"What's different about this is that the need on the humanitarian side is dovetailing so perfectly with the business plan on the corporate side," said Nancy Roman, the World Food Programme's director for private partnerships.

PepsiCo is unveiling the plan on Wednesday at the Clinton Global Initiative, former U.S. President Bill Clinton's annual philanthropic summit in New York.

PepsiCo also hopes to use the chickpeas to make a food product it can sell in the Ethiopian market, where it currently has a small presence selling locally produced drinks and some snacks imported from Egypt. It also would like to boost the amount of chickpeas it sources from Ethiopia, for use in its hummus spreads or for other potential products in the future.

Derek Yach, senior vice president of global health and agriculture policy for PepsiCo, emphasized the business case for the project along with the humanitarian case.

"You have to have a profit margin if it is going to be sustained," Yach said in an interview at PepsiCo headquarters in a New York suburb. "This is not the Ethiopia one normally thinks of. We are coming in early, when opportunities are at their maximum and government is supportive of real change."

BOOSTING SUPPLY AND DEMAND

The International Monetary Fund expects Ethiopia -- the No. 6 producer of chickpeas globally in 2008, the latest year for which figures are available -- to show economic growth of about 7.5 percent this year, albeit off a low base.

read the rest at Reuters (http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/21/us-pepsico-chickpeas-idUSTRE78K0MR20110921)

Ethiopia readies 3 mn hectare for investors


Ethiopia, a landlocked country located in the horn of Africa, is readying over 3 million hectare of land for investors to develop large-scale commercial farms, according to a government official.

“We have developed 3.6 million hectare from the National Land Bank to attract foreign direct investments. Of this, we have already allotted 400,000 hectare, with 70 per cent being to Indian investors. The remaining three million-odd hectare is now available for local and foreign investors,” said Esayas Kebede, director, ministry of agriculture and rural development, Ethiopia.


He was speaking to Business Standard at the India-Africa Business Partnership Summit, a two-day event focused on bilateral trade between the two countries organised by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Ficci) here recently.
Ethiopia, which has privatised cultivation of cotton, palm oil, rubber and sugarcane, the identified investment priority areas, had so far seen investments to the tune of $6 billion from India. Over 9,200 investors had received licences for developing large-scale commercial farms in Ethiopia since 1996, out of which around 1,300 are foreign.

“There are also huge investment opportunities in the areas of agro processing, horticulture and floriculture, dairy, meat and leather products. The leasing rates are rational. What we are looking for is rich investors from India, China and other countries, who can contribute to the social development of Ethiopia and help reduce food insecurity,” Kebede said.

The leasing period depends on the crop. For annual crops, the lease period would be up to 20-25 years, while it would be up to 35-40 years for perennial crops, with the minimum investment to take land on lease being $100,000, he added.

Kebede said that the Ethiopian government had a clear policy, specially on the incentives side. Investors are facilitated with a seven-year tax holiday. They are also allowed to repatriate 100 per cent of their earnings to any country out of Ethiopia.

Brushing aside reports on forcible relocation of locals and poor wages to those working on the new farmlands, he said, “We are expanding large-scale farming only in areas where we have sufficient arable land without depriving local farmers of their livelihood. Around 3 million people here are expected to require foreign food assistance this year. We expect our commercial farming initiatives to solve this food shortage.

http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/ethiopia-readies-3-mn-hectare-for-investors/452743/

Ambo Gnemer Agro & Integrated Industries - Making citizens become investors



Full interview is found on the link; I just quoted the parts specifically about agriculture.

http://www.ethiopianreporter.com/pre-en/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1789:making-citizens-become-investors&catid=105:interview&Itemid=518

This company obviously lacks the experience to develop and manage such a large piece of land. Bring in the Brazilians or something. Im always dubious when newly formed local companies with little or no experience are given these big contracts. A new local company starting off with 2 or 3 thousand hectares is okay. But this? I would even rather a foreign company that was obliged to sell half of its output locally.

Interesting news on indian company farming cotton in Ethiopia:

Indian textile company launches cotton harvest, spinning plant
To provide at least 3,000 jobs
Indian based CLC Industries Plc will harvest by next month the first 2,500 hectares of cotton from the 25,000 hectares of farm land they recently leased. CLC Industries are operating in two locations, Jawi zone in the Amhara regional state on 5,000 hectares of land and the Danguru district of Benishangul Gumuz state where they have 20,000 hectares. So far they have invested 789.4 million birr.
They plan to use the cotton to create a huge spinning plant for textiles in Kombolcha located on 50 hectares of land, which is expected to start commercial production by the second quarter of 2013.
CLC Industries feel they can produce a large amount of cotton using modern technology and machines from India. The company produces hybrid cotton seeds of Indian origin in its farms which can be ripened for harvest within five to six months of planting.
The company currently has 1,100 employees in the cotton farms including seven Indian experts and when the cotton seeds are ripe they expect to employ 10,000 people.
At first CLC Industries will export two containers of cotton per day. They plan to supply approximately 1200 Metric Tons of Lint Cotton to local textile companies starting next month. Beginning in 2013, the company’s textile factory will be using the cotton from their own farms.
This month CLC will begin constructing the textile factory that they plan to invest 70 million dollars into, said their liaison officer Markos Terfa.
“We have already signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Turkish owned Ayka Addis and Kombolcha Textile companies to supply cotton to their factory and we are in negotiation with other textile companies as well,” Markos told Capital.
He says the factory should employ 1,200 and plant 50,000 spindles for the first stage. A loan from the Development Bank of Ethiopia has allowed them to purchase state of the art machines from Italy, Belgium and India. When the factory is fully operational it will provide 3,000 jobs.
Markos says that the company chose Ethiopia for its first African investment because the country is stable, has a favorable investment climate and will benefit from a five year tax exemption the government is allowing for cotton producers. He added that Ethiopia only covers 35 percent of its cotton needs from the domestic market.
CLC industries is a subsidiary of CLC Spintex, an Indian company established in 1946 with headquarters in New Delhi and five factories in India with other factories located in Uzbekistan, Czech Republic, Turkey and Malaysia. The turnover capital of CLC Spintex was about 600 million dollars in 2010.

http://www.capitalethiopia.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=15729:indian-textile-company-launches-cotton-harvest-spinning-plant&catid=12:local-news&Itemid=4

Related to the above post, I found the land lease agreement between the indian company and the ethio government online. I guess this is an attempt at transparency by our government ... The lease payment totals at about 830million birr for 25000 hectares. Interesting ...
http://www.eap.gov.et/sites/default/files/CLC-Agreement.pdf

Wise move, keeping everything a secret with only boost false rumors.

Good article:

Spreading in Gambella

Investment, criticism, opportunity

In a sparsely populated area of 3.4 million hectares of Gambella Regional State, foreigners have become a increasingly common sight over the past five years. A growing number of companies have shown interest in venturing into the agriculture sector there and the government has been letting them.

The number of companies who have been granted investment licences in the region has jumped into the hundreds since 2005/06. Yet only 34 licences had been granted in the five years before that. This interest by both local and international companies to lease land in the region has been met with criticism from pundits as nothing more than land grabbing.

There has been no environmental impact assessment done to date and people are being driven off their lands forcefully, allege these pundits, one of which is the Oakland Institute, a think-tank based out of California in the United States.

However, theirs is not an accusation the Ethiopian government seems to have given much attention to. It has been staunchly refuting the allegations and has been accusing these proponents of disseminating such claims to promote hidden agendas. The investment allows for job creation, technology transfer and helps in food insecurity on lands that have lain bare without any agricultural activities on them, it argues.

The government believes that the lands which are not used by small farmers should be used for huge commercial farms and thus require huge capital investment. Indeed some of the companies involved in the region’s plan for big projects require heavy machinery and investment in infrastructure.

One of the companies that have acquired land, perhaps the biggest in Africa, is India-based Karuturi Agro Products Plc, which received a 100,000ha plot. It plans to plant sugar cane, rice, cotton and maize.

A project by a subsidiary of Karuturi Global Ltd, through the Agro Products Plc, is the first venture for the company. Karuturi is known as the biggest rose producer in the world.

Having finished a one-year-long harvest of seedlings on 63ha for its sugar cane plantation, it is now planting 10,000ha with it. Also in the works is the erection of a sugar factory.

Karuturi believes that accusations of residents in the area not based on facts.

“The area used to be covered by forest which we had to clear,” Karmjeet Singh Sekhon, project director, told Fortune. “Our projects benefit not only the company but also the local people in terms of employment and transfer.”

On top of the sugar cane plantations and the factory construction projects, the company is also undertaking construction of residential buildings for the company’s employees. Currently, there are 362 permanent and another 650 to 1,600 contractual employees in the company.

However, not all employees are not happy with their pay.

Abera Lera, 28, is one of the employees of the company. Although he has been working for the past seven months for a salary of 1,800 Br, he says it is not commensurate with work in the area.

“We do not have hardship allowances and we have to cover our own food expenses,” Abera, who has worked at Wongi Sugar Factor for 10 years. “Although we have been told the situation will get better, I am thinking about leaving the job,” he told Fortune.

Sharing his concern is Deneke Tora, who also works at Wongi with Abera.

Similar discontent is echoed by employees of Saudi Star, another mega investment project in the region. Incorporated in 2009 with a capital of 500 million Br, Saudi Star aims to grow rice on a 10,000ht plot it acquired using water from the Alwero Dam, which was constructed during the Dergue Regime to supply water to grow cotton.

It plans to access this dam, which has been idle for two decades, using a canal, to irrigate the farm. To facilitate this, the company has signed a contract worth 85 million dollars with GRC, a Pakistani company, for the construction of more than 30km of canal two weeks ago. The Pakistani company has agreed to complete the project within 11 months.

The company, established by Mohammed Al-Amoudi, has already put 80 million dollars into buying agricultural machinery and equipment from Caterpillar, which will be delivered by Ries Engineering SC.

Girma Umad, 28, is one of the employees currently working as a machine operator at Saudi Star. Before he came to work at the project, he used to live in the nearby town of Abobo with his parents.

Although he appreciates the chance to work without having any prior skill sets, he is not happy about the pay as well.

“I have managed to develop the skills needed through observation and personal practise, he told Fortune in appreciation for the overall working conditions. “However, the 25 Br I get a day is not even enough for my daily meals.”

A few weeks back some of the field workers had gone on strike demanding an increase in pay. This was triggered by an increase in wages for those involved in construction work.

However, the issue was resolved after discussions with the workers who received an increment of three Birr a day. The misunderstanding occurred as the increments were not given to all at the same time, according to Seifu wolde, the construction manager at the site.

Despite their complaints, many of the workers are still happy about the work opportunity they are getting.

“It is exactly this kind of technology transfer using machinery that we want to have shifted to our people,” Goaner Yer Zuor, vice president of the regional state, told Fortune.

It seems that the notion of employing local labour is taking root at Ruchi Agro Plc, another Indian company, which received 25,000ha in March 2009. The labour composition at the site is 70pc local, with the remaining technicians coming from India, according to Manohar Lankella (Phd), project manager of the company.

“We employ Indians because we use modern technology,” he told Fortune. “But they are also here to teach locals about how to use them.”

Currently Ruchi employs more than 160 employees.

Manhohar has had the same response to the “land grab” accusations, which he too says are not true.

“The land was empty and we had to clear the land before we could start our work,” he told Fortune, responding to accusations that people were forced to relocate to give way for his company.

Obanga Amir Okoch, 25, a native to the area and an employee of Ruchi agree. Obanga grew up in a local area called “fugnido. The land had lain bare for many years, and people were forced to relocate there during the military regime, according to Obanga.

“However, people left right after the regime was overthrown because they were put there against their will,” he explained to Fortune.

On the other hand, locals like Edosa Telila, 25, who has a diploma in law, seem to have no problem with the presence of foreigners on their land. In his view the locals are benefiting from ground water works and donations of maize at harvest time.

However, it is not just foreigners who have received land in the region, but local companies as well. One such company is Bazen Agricultural & Industrial Development which leased 10,000ha in 2005. It is currently preparing to undertake the clearing of 3,000ha to use as part of 7,200ha for its plantation.

Cotton, peas, maize and mango constitute the main cash and food crops currently cultivated on 2,300, 160, 80, and 53ha of land, respectively. A preliminary 10ha of vineyards also makes up part of the total cultivated land by the company so far. The company has plans to increase the actual cultivated land to 5,230 hectares by 2013.

The current potential harvest from its cotton farm, which takes up the lion’s share of the company’s cultivated land, is about 28 to 30ql per hectare, according to Desta Gebre, General Manager of Bazen, which employs, 48 permanent, 67 contractual and on average 913 seasonal workers.

“More than 60pc of the daily workers usually come from Wolaita in the Southern Regional State, while the balance is made up of local workers from around the farm site,” he told Fortune.

Workers at Bazen seem to have less to complain about than other sites. Daily workers get paid 22 Br along with a kilogramme of maize flour, 50 gram of shiro and 30 gram of salt daily. They sleep in dormitories and receive one Birr for every kilogramme of crop they collect on top of their salary during the harvest season.

It seems that while many outside the area debate the land grab issue, the real concerns on the ground for the most part are about wages. Hardly any of the workers of the people who live nearby seem to have any notion that they are being overrun.

There are 306,916 people living in the region, many of whom are not involved in agriculture at all.

Allegations of land grabbing are totally baseless, according Wondimu Filate, public relations expert at the Ministry of Agriculture (MoA).

“The current government policy in agriculture promotes both commercial and small agricultural farming,” he told Fortune, saying that anyone who wants to get involved is handled according to their request.

Commercial agricultural investors who want to lease less than 5,000ha of land can conclude their agreement with the regional states while agreements in excess of that are at the federal level.

The large scale commercial agricultural ventures for which specialized equipment and know-ow are required cannot be undertaken by local companies, according to Wondimu.

Indeed this has been the case for a few of the farms in Gambella. Karuturi reported a loss of 15 million dollars when the Alwero and Baro rivers flooded. The company lost 60,000tn of maize that would have been collected despite the presence of dikes on the sides that face the rivers.

However, the 1.8m tall dikes were not enough to withstand the onslaught of water. That prompted the company to place dikes all around the farm and increase the height of existing ones. Currently, it plans to build a polder, which is low-lying tract of land enclosed by dikes forming an artificial hydrological entity with no connection to outside water.

This is to be accomplished by building walls that are four meters tall and nine meters wide.

As this is an undertaking that cannot be done by a local company, Karuturi has hired Water and Power Consultancy Services (WAPCOS), an Indian public sector enterprise with autonomy to enter joint ventures and subsidiaries, to provide consulting services in flood control and the design of irrigation & drainage systems. Water Watch, a Dutch advisory firm, has also been retained to provide satellite information on hydrological processes and water management issues.

The undertaking will cost as much as the crop that was lost, officials of the company had told Fortune after the flooding.

The magnitude of the scale of projects is also comparable at the farm site of Saudi Star. Not being able to find local companies to construct the canal for its irrigation, it has had to look outside and settled on the Pakistani firm.

It is also constructing two 25-million dollar mills in Gambella and Bishoftu (Debrezeit), 47km from the capital, for the processing of the rice it grows before it is packaged

http://www.addisfortune.com/Spreading%20in%20Gambella-Investment%20criticism%20opportunity.htm

The workers at Bazen (the local company) seem to have it made. This is why local investors need to be encouraged to go into farming - we have more emotional investment in the workers than foreign investors, so are more likely to give better incentives.

Some complaints are legitimate, but others are just ridiculous. The guy earning 1800 birr per month is being a complete brat. He lives in the middle of nowhere! People in Addis don't earn that :ohno:

I enjoyed the article, it's nice to read about projects that's operational.

Indians are there to earn a quick buck, and I welcome them, but it's like you say.. a local is more likely to care about the people's well-being as well.

.... but it's like you say.. a local is more likely to care about the people's well-being as well.

Almost all local business men and women are the most brutal with dull business mind & zero creativity...locals do not hesitate to hide edible oil under their bed to create artificial shortage.


“I have managed to develop the skills needed through observation and personal practise, he told Fortune in appreciation for the overall working conditions. “However, the 25 Br I get a day is not even enough for my daily meals.”

^^:lol:
Classic Ye Abesha attitude!

This years grain harvest from small hold farmers estimated to be 218 million quintals (21.8 million tons) :banana: .This is really a good news after last years drought affected the south-eastern regions and last Novembers unseasonal rainfall threaten the harvest.
Ethiopia plans to increase agricultural output from 19 million tons in 2010 to 39 million tons in 2015.
To watch the news check it below starting the 4:30 min.

nln0CpDfgh8

Didn't know where to put this clip. It's about a recently-built water reservoir in Afar and how it's changing the area. http://www.ethiotube.net/video/15933/ETV-Documentary--Gift-of-the-Afar-Deseret--Transforming-the-nomadic-life-of-the-Afars. It's an odd and long documentary. Just skip parts here and there to get the gist of it.

Didn't know where to put this clip. It's about a recently-built water reservoir in Afar and how it's changing the area. http://www.ethiotube.net/video/15933/ETV-Documentary--Gift-of-the-Afar-Deseret--Transforming-the-nomadic-life-of-the-Afars. It's an odd and long documentary. Just skip parts here and there to get the gist of it.

Tendaho Dam is what the documentary is about... the sugar corp is counting on it to irrigate about 60,000 ha of sugar cane plantation in the Awash Delta, for the factory they plan to install there... I believe the construction for the canal system is still on-going...

The dam (& its reservoir) has multiple benefits for the local community; and one significant impact will be in flood protection... the Dubti area had to deal with Awash overflows for decades (especially since Koka Dam started losing reservoir capacity due to silt ).... not any more ...

Thanks rasta, you seem really knowledgeable about this.

Hopefully the local community can also start farming using the reservoir. It was surreal to see locals wearing life vests and fishing :lol:, but it's encouraging.

Karuturi sets sight on sugarcane crushing factory


http://www.waltainfo.com/images/dec_2011/Karuturi_sets_sight.jpg


Addis Ababa, December 19 (WIC) – Karuturi Agro Products Plc, the Indian Agro company, sets its sight on erecting a sugarcane factory with a capacity to crush 7,000 tons of cane per day (tcd) in Gambella Regional State.

The company, which operates on 100,000ha plot in Gambella leased in 2009 from the Ministry of Agriculture (MoA), started a sugarcane nursery on 65ha in 2010/11 season and expects the crushing plant to be ready in time for harvest.

“In three years, 15,000ha will be covered with sugarcane plantation,” Assefa Arega, manager of Karuturi’s sugarcane plantation, told WIC. “This [sugarcane plantation] requires a crushing factory with a capacity to crush 7,000 tcd.”

The company is currently undertaking a feasibility study. According to the farm manager, site identification, procurements and installation works for sugarcane crushing factory will begin in early 2012.

Ethiopia aims to increase sugar production fourfold within the coming four years to 1.3 million metric tons from 300,000 tons per year. In a bid to achieve the plan the country will spend 1.4 billion dollars to build new and expand existing sugar plants.

Current sugar supply from the three sugar factories does not meet the domestic sugar demand, which is around 440,000 tons per year according to some studies.

“Erecting a sugar factory in Ethiopia will have a huge economic benefit not only for domestic consumption but also if you consider the sugar consumption of neighboring South Sudan, Kenya, Djibouti and Somalia who rely on imports.”

Karaturi says it is conducting the sugarcane plantation adjacent to the sugarcane factory establishment. The sugarcane nursery, located some 20 km from the camp site, will expand to 1,000 ha net area, according to the farm manager.

“Sugarcane takes an average of 17 months to mature but here due to the high temperature we only need 12 months,” said Assefa who predicts sugarcane crushing to being in two years.

read @ Waltainfo (http://www.waltainfo.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1035:karuturi-sets-sight-on-sugarcane-crushing-factory&catid=52:national-news&Itemid=291)

Ethiopia invests in farmers to achieve country's middle-income ambitionsFields of red sorghum in terraced fields that stretch into the distance are a common sight in the scenic mountains of eastern Ethiopia, giving a misleading impression of bountiful harvests despite this year's drought in the east Africa.

Farmers tie five or more tall sorghum stalks together so they support one another, and the red seeds at the top of the plant grow heavier as the plants ripen, giving them a triffid-like appearance. A common plant and an important staple crop for millions of poor Ethiopians, sorghum is ubiquitous in the region around Dire Dawa, 352km north-east of Addis Ababa, the capital.

Apple orchards are a more surprising presence. Dadi Yadete, a bearded 72-year-old, took a gamble three years ago and started growing apples, a fruit that he didn't know. Hesitant and doubtful initially, he planted 12 trees, but the experiment has paid off. Located 2,300 metres above sea level, these Ethiopian highlands enjoy a temperate climate, almost alpine, where apples can thrive.

Yadete, who has two wives and nine children, now has 70 flourishing apple trees on his small plot of land – about 0.5 hectares – where he also has a large avocado tree. He also grows barley, a few coffee bushes, sweet potato, green pepper and bright red hot chillies.

"Life was very difficult when I was trying to grow maize and barley," said Yadete. "I was producing nothing and I was receiving food aid, now I don't need food aid." He gets about $600 a year from the sale of his apples, and he owns four cows and two oxen, which makes him a relatively wealthy man.

One cow and one ox count as wealth in Ethiopia, which ranked 174 out of 187 countries in the 2011 human development index. Ethiopia is to receive £331m ($521m) in British aid a year until 2015, making it one of the biggest beneficiaries of UK development money. Growth has been impressive in recent years, although its human rights record is frequently criticised.

Others in Yadete's village of Thefebanti, which has about 200 households (five people to a household on average) are also prospering through the sale of apples, as well as the production of seedlings. A few steps away from Yadete's plot, a group of women are packing little pots with soil and compost as the village also has a tree nursery. There are rows of tree seedlings, including prodocarpus – good for timber – and hagenia and juniper.

The village is doing well, despite initial impressions of extreme poverty. A bumpy unpaved road runs past homes made from mud and wattle with corrugated iron roofs, but a regular market in the village and proximity to the main road give it an advantage over remote villages higher in the mountains.

Yadete and his fellow villagers are the beneficiaries of Meret (from the Amharic word for land), a joint venture between the UN's World Food Programme and the Ethiopian government. A response to the food crises of the 1970s, Meret targets chronically food insecure communities with the WFP providing food for those involved – 3kg of cereal every work day – to each participant for three months. Meret also provides technical advice for farmers to reforest barren hillsides, and build or refurbish terraces. The key is to win the commitment and trust of the villagers.

In contrast to the top-down approach of the notorious Derg – the Mengistu regime that ruled from 1972 to 1991 – Meret workers discuss with farmers their problems and the steps they need to take. In the case of Yadete and his fellow farmers, agreement was reached to close off the top of the mountain slopes above the village to farming and grazing for two years. Trees were planted, terraces built or repaired, and the slopes dotted with mini water barriers made of stone and earth in the shape of a v (herrings), or semi-circles (eyebrows) that help to retain water and to heal the land.

About 45% of Ethiopia's land is above 1,500m, with mountainous terrain, plateaux, steep slopes and deep valleys. Despite extensive groundwater resources, 90% of agriculture depends on rainfall rather than irrigation. Rains, which tend to occur in bursts concentrated in three to four months of the year, has grown more erratic in recent years, which has been attributed to climate change.

Because of population pressure – at 79 million, Ethiopia is Africa's second most populous nation, after Nigeria – much of the land in the highlands has been overfarmed, and trees have been cut down, allowing rainwater to flow downhill instead of being retained. In parts of this region, the terraces look bone dry and the sorghum stunted.

The Dire Dawa sub-office covers 59 Meret sites in 13 districts, a total of 35,500 households, taking in 175,000 people who benefited directly from the programme this year. The sites cover 53,866 hectares but, as Meret officials point out, it is a drop in the ocean, despite a big push on agriculture.

Agricultural transformation

Ethiopia is devoting 17% of its budget to farming, well above the 10% commitment agreed by African governments. In its ambitious growth and transformation plan, Ethiopia has set an overall target of at least 8.1% growth in agriculture between 2011 and 2015 as part of its goal to reach middle-income status by 2025. It calls for more than doubling the production of key crops from 18.1m to 39.5m tonnes.

Agriculture is key for Ethiopia, accounting for 45% of economic output and employing about 80% of the population. Despite its dependence on rainwater, agricultural experts see no reason why the country cannot be Africa's breadbasket if it realises its agricultural potential. "As long as you can control the water, you can grow whatever you want," said a private investor, who is leasing land for dairy cows.

In 2008, the prime minister, Meles Zenawi, commissioned the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation to write a review of agriculture to see why the country was not getting a bigger bang for its birr. The review concluded that despite significant investment, there was a lack of co-ordination among government agencies and a lack of skilled staff to implement largescale initiatives.

The review looked at other countries, such as Taiwan, Malaysia, South Korea and Chile, that had successfully transformed agriculture, and found that a common denominator was an institution that drove change. Meles liked the review, and decided to set up the Agricultural Transformation Agency. Unusually, he appointed someone from the Ethiopian diaspora – Khalid Bomba, 45, a former investment banker at JP Morgan – to lead it. The ATA office in Addis, which opened in August, fizzes with the energy of a start-up as young, eager staff bustle about in stark contrast to the sleepy atmosphere over at the ministry of agriculture.

Bomba explains that the ATA's job will be to identify bottlenecks in the system and try to come up with solutions, and to co-ordinate the activities of key players from the agriculture ministry to the country's four biggest regions.

Bomba gives an example of the kind of hurdles he faces in the planting of tef, a cereal used to make Ethiopia's spongy flatbread staple, injera. "We have carried out promising tests that show farmers can grow more by using less seeds and planting in rows instead of a scatter approach," said Bomba. "It's counter-intuitive, but the yield is higher by sowing 5kg of tef instead of 25kg-30kg per hectare. The problem is that we don't have the people to train the agricultural extension workers to spread the message to the farmers."

The jury is out on the ATA, although Bomba has Meles's ear, which counts for much in what one development official described as the world's last Albanian-type Marxist state. As long as Meles is around, other ministers will have to pay attention to the ATA, which is overseen by a board chaired by the prime minister himself. Bomba sees himself staying in the job for three to five years to train Ethiopian officials to take over and run the agency themselves. The plan is for the agency to phase itself out in 15 years' time.

While Bomba and others in Addis grapple with policy issues, Yadete is doing his bit for Ethiopian agriculture by growing his apples. Despite his successful adoption of a fruit that he had never tasted until three years ago, Yadete and his wife hardly eat their apples, which he describes as tasting like bananas. "I don't eat the apples," he says, "Whenever I see them, I see money."http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/2011/dec/21/ethiopia-boost-farming-agriculture-invest?newsfeed=true


Here's the sleek website of the Agricultural Transformation Agency: http://www.ata.gov.et/ I had never heard of it before.

Ethiopia invests in farmers to achieve country's middle-income ambitionshttp://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/2011/dec/21/ethiopia-boost-farming-agriculture-invest?newsfeed=true


Here's the sleek website of the Agricultural Transformation Agency: http://www.ata.gov.et/ I had never heard of it before.

:cheers: Its a good start.

That can't be an actual Ethiopian government website.

Documentary on ECX shown on PBS a year or two ago: http://www.pbs.org/wnet/wideangle/episodes/the-market-maker/full-episode/5293/

Ethiopia is one of 11 African countries identified as having the largest amounts of still-uncultivated land, estimated at 59 million additional hectares according to national statistics.10 A large part of the still uncultivated lands are being developed via Federal Government allocations for new commercial farms. Our compilation of the relevant data suggests that about 350,000 hectares, or one-tenth, of the planned 3 million hectare allocation has already taken place.

Of the already granted allocations, we find that the five largest commercial land recipients are: (1) Karuturi Agro Products Plc; (2) Shapoorji Pallonji; (3) BHO Bio Products Plc; (4) Ruchi Soya Industries; and (5) CLC Spentex Industries Limited (see Table 2.3). The average size of the land leased is 15,000 hectares, but excluding the top two exceptional cases, the median commercial farm size allocation is 5,000 hectares. We also find that the mix between foreign and domestic investors (based on land area) is about 5-1, though this changes to just 2-1 if we exclude the top two cases.

In terms of crop production, plans by commercial farm investors are mainly focused on cereals and cash crops. The focus on basic cereals such as wheat and maize makes particular sense, given the country‘s large reliance on importing such food items in recent years: for example, cereal imports (which are comprised mainly of wheat), have jumped from just $157 million about a decade ago to $480 million in 2010 , or from 2 to 4 percent of total imports.


........


All of the above encouraging trends—favorable policies, the large pipeline of new projects, and the start of several promising commercial farming operations—are of course subject to risks and two in particular could jeopardize the promised gains from an expansion in commercial farms.

First, there is the usual fear that promised and committed investments may not materialize due to a host of ―execution risks‖: investors failing to put in their equity contributions; becoming unable to find loan financing; or encountering operational problems related to poor infrastructure, land clearing, and so forth. However, it is becoming increasingly unlikely for investments to fall through due to such factors. The dedicated government unit at the Ministry of Agriculture is, for example, screening potential investors with much stricter standards to ensure that initial capital outlays are actually put in place and tight ‗delivery periods‘ of as short as six to twelve months are being imposed as an additional check on performance (i.e., investors who fail to develop a given tract of land as promised lose the lease to the undeveloped parts of land).

Second, there is a modest risk that a backlash against commercial farm allocations builds up as the public discourse on this issue is sometimes dominated by highly critical commentary focused on themes of ―land-grabbing‖, population displacement, and/or environmental concerns. However, while possibly legitimate concerns in other parts of the world, the validity of such criticisms is quite weak in the Ethiopian case and the potential for a domestic backlash particularly unlikely: Ethiopia is a country where any gains to food production are to be welcomed given still-fragile food security conditions; the allocations are open to and being taken up by domestic as well as foreign investors; the scale of the land allocations involve just 3 percent of total land and cannot by any stretch be seen as large-scale land-grabbing; and the areas of land involved are generally remote areas with no or very little populated settlements. For these reasons, we think both of the above mentioned potential risks are unlikely to adversely impact the production increases envisaged from most of Ethiopia‘s commercial farms.http://www.accesscapitalsc.com/components/com_acymailing/upload/ethiopia%20macroeconomic%20handbook%202011-12%20dec%2030%202011.pdf

Access Capital has released an analysis of where Ethiopia is headed over the next 5 years - it expands on agriculture quite a bit, but I posted here the gist of it. I know there has been a lot of concern about foreign investors, so I thought it would be an interesting read for those interested.

Page 21 of the report lists all the commercial allocations (those at Federal level - there may be more at regional level).

Of the 23 commercial farms established through federal allocation, 13 are Ethiopian-owned (including diaspora); and that's excluding Al Amoudi's investment that is listed as foreign.

Here:

http://img535.imageshack.us/img535/3420/farmsp.png (http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/535/farmsp.png/)


Foreign land grab seems a bit of an over-exaggeration, don't you think? :|

Foreign land grab seems a bit of an over-exaggeration, don't you think? :|

It's not only exaggerated but over-cooked.
Local & Diaspora anti-government activists may have right to complain & use it for their political end - however, it makes me really sick when whites dare to tell us how to....!

It's not only exaggerated but over-cooked.
Local & Diaspora anti-government activists may have right to complain & use it for their political end - however, it makes me really sick when whites dare to tell us how to....!

Agree!!!

It's not only exaggerated but over-cooked.
Local & Diaspora anti-government activists may have right to complain & use it for their political end - however, it makes me really sick when whites dare to tell us how to....!
Western propaganda, It's as ridiculous as medias campaign of calling the Chinese "colonizers". There might be some bad cases out there, but they are generalizing the entire continent.

One can see that almost all of these leases are in the least populated regions. Interesting find abesha.

Ethiopian coffee bonanza lifts world output hopes

World coffee output over the last two seasons has beaten previous expectations by nearly 5m bags thanks to far-higher-than-expected production by Ethiopia, the birthplace of the bean, which has overtaken Colombia.

Global coffee output in 2010-11 was 134.2m bags, more than 1m bags higher than previously expected, the International Coffee Organization said.

For the current 2011-12 season, the production estimate was lifted by 3.8m bags to 132.4m bags.

The revisions reflected a massive upgrade, totalling nearly 6m bags, in output in Ethiopia, in whose Kaffa province the bean is believed to have originated.

The 9.8m bags that Ethiopia production is now believed to have reached in 2011-12 would rank the country "as the world's third-largest producer after Brazil and Vietnam", the ICO said.:cheers:

In recent seasons, Colombia and Indonesia, have been battling it out for third rank, but with both unveiling a series of sub-par crops thanks largely to excessive rainfall blamed on the La Nina weather pattern.

Investment programme

The ICO gave no reason for its massive Ethiopian upgrades.

However, the rise in production, now seen doubling in three seasons, come amid a government drive to more than double coffee output in the five years to 2015 – a campaign which has received a tailwind from high bean prices which have encouraged investment in the sector.

Indeed, the production record contrasts with a commonly-held belief that Africa is likely to prove unable to fulfil its large potential in coffee, held back by political and climatological volatility.

Ethiopia is Africa's largest coffee producer, while the bean itself is of huge importance to Ethiopia, which has more than 1m families dependent on the crop, which accounts for more than one-quarter of gross national product (GNP) and accounts for some 40% of exports.

Price move

The upgrade to the estimate for Ethiopian output offset small downgrades to production forecasts for Central America, which suffered heavy rains late last year.

Nonetheless, robusta coffee edged 1.3% higher to $1,854 a tonne in London on Monday, for the best-traded March contract.

New York commodity markets, where arabica coffee is traded, were closed for a public holiday.

Ethiopia grows overwhelmingly arabica coffee.
http://www.agrimoney.com/news/ethiopian-coffee-bonanza-lifts-world-output-hopes--4051.html

Wow! Doubling production in 3 seasons is fantastic!! I hope this is a real, sustainable trend, and not a short-term boost to the sector.

Good to learn that you're the 3rd producer now. Are there any plans to set up coffee processing and transformation industries in Ethiopia itself? Instead of exporting mainly raw beans, the country should engage in exporting finished goods as well. Ethiopia would keep the value added locally and generate much more income from coffee.

Good to learn that you're the 3rd producer now. Are there any plans to set up coffee processing and transformation industries in Ethiopia itself? Instead of exporting mainly raw beans, the country should engage in exporting finished goods as well. Ethiopia would keep the value added locally and generate much more income from coffee.


Here's an article related to this from a few weeks back...

http://www.2merkato.com/20111208651/kabu-coffee-to-provide-export-standard-ethiopian-coffee
===================
Kabu Coffee, to Provide Export Standard Ethiopian Coffee
Thursday, 08 December 2011

Kabu Coffee has announced plans to market export standard Ethiopian coffee. The company has expanded its investment capital to 10 million birr for this venture.

Kabu is marketing high quality roasted coffee to international and domestic customers according to Aman Adinew company advisor. The company aimed to venture out in this direction from the outset he said.

Kabu strives to carefully control the quality of its ingredients to ensure the quality service promised by its slogan ‘Coffee Redefined’ said Aman.
Adding value to Ethiopia’s number one export, coffee, is sure to make the sector more profitable explains Aman. Ethiopia needs to become competitive in the international roasted coffee market dominated by Europeans he said.

Kabu is partnering with a German firm to introduce roasted and instant coffee into the national market. The company believes that coffee roasted and prepared from Ethiopia and not blended with other types of Coffee will be warmly welcomed on the international market said Aman.

The new venture has the potential to open employment opportunities for many and result in the transfer of knowledge into the country as well as earning foreign exchange. Kabu will be establishing a laboratory at its headquarters to train roasters, exporters and coffee quality professionals. The laboratory will also test the consistency and quality of Kabu’s coffee said Aman.

Kabu aims to be involved in all steps of the process in adding value to the product including, farming, milling, processing, roasting and exporting explained Aman.

Kabu is owned by Ethiopian celebrity Aster Aweke.

Source: Capita

Next step is to export the Khaldi's Coffee chain to China where they can't be sued. :D

:lol::lol::lol:

If I were her I would do some modifications soon. When Ethiopia joins the WTO, Starbucks can make a direct claim on its design and she'll be in trouble.

I'd change the color and some other aspects of it. I do like the coffee cup though I would prefer a "sini" instead.

:lol::lol::lol:
If I were her I would do some modifications soon. When Ethiopia joins the WTO, Starbucks can make a direct claim on its design and she'll be in trouble.

I'd change the color and some other aspects of it. I do like the coffee cup though I would prefer a "sini" instead.

Hey chu chu - I mean abesha,

Don't forget Ambes Teweldetoo...


".......a small business owner Ambes Tewelde has started selling fine Ethiopian coffee in a busily packed coffee shop named Starbucks............ Ambes Tewelde said his friend in Atlanta suggested :lol::lol:the name, so he started using that name and the locals like that name. So he is going to keep it. In this coffee house, the coffee is done in a traditional manner. .......
His shop carries the big sign as shown in the picture "Starbucks" sign over the door, and even has the green logo only the lady is replaced by a picture of his baby son superimposed....."

http://m.digitaljournal.com/article/138839?doredir=0&noredir=1

Egziooooo :ohno:

I swear we need a massive stick to beat creativity into people. Seriously, how hard is it to come up with an original yet Ethiopian name??

LOL! I blame his ethio-american friend that suggested the name, he should've known better. The WTO deal will screw things up for a lot
of people, I don't think they're aware of the rules they're breaking either.

and that Intercontinental wannabe hotel.

..lets not forget beyonce bar in Bahir Dar :D

..lets not forget beyonce bar in Bahir Dar :D

That was approved by beyonce though. From reliable sources. :banana:

and its a night club

I think we missed this article a few years ago (2007) -

Tigray State to Get 200m Br Vineyard

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia – Tigray State to Get 200m Br Vineyard. Ten prominent businesspeople engaged in flower farms are planning to venture in developing a vineyard and establish wineries, forming a new company two weeks ago, Ethio Grapes SC, with a capital of one million Birr.

The company is formed by Tsegaye Abebe, shareholder of Ethio Flora Plc and president of the Ethiopian Horticultural Association; Solomon Sebhatu, shareholder of Menagesha Flower Plc; Endale Yirga, shareholder of the Kangaroo Business Group; Seife Bedada, shareholder of Dire Industrial Group; Michael Asres, shareholder of Summit Flower Plc; Yidnekachew Ayele, shareholder of Minaye Plc (importer of Deluxe Furniture); Tadele Abreha, shareholder of Green Coffee Plc; and Tesfalidet Hagos, board chairman of Ethio Grapes and shareholder of Luna Export Slaughterhouse Plc.
“All of us in this company know each other,” Tesfalidet told Fortune. “We hope this to be a model business for further investments.”

The new company’s first venture will be an investment of 200 million Br, to develop a vineyard and farm on a 1,000hct leased plot, to be made available by the administration of Tigray Regional State. Of the total plot promised by the Regional State, Ethio Grapes has begun work on 400hct. Moges Mesfin, head of the Tigray Region Investment Office, confirmed that this is the largest amount of land ever divvied out in the State.

“We are happy with the company’s active moves,” Moges told Fortune.
The Tigray Region is primarily chosen due to its environmental suitability for grape production as its climate is closer to that found by the Mediterranean Sea, said company sources.

Allocating a preliminary budget for the compensations required for the residents, the State has arranged two suitable sites for the company to choose; a plot stretching from the Mekele International Airport to the town, or on the road from Mekele to Wikro town.

Ethio Grapes is interested in designing a business model following the French Castel Group’s lead in penetrating both domestic and international markets, disclosed a source.
Established 50 years ago, Castel has established a reputation in international markets, specialising in wine, mineral water, beer and soft drinks bottling. The Group has secured, six months ago, a 200hct plot from the Privatisation and Public Enterprises Supervising Agency (PPESA), in a bid to expand its farm in three years and install a plant with a project cost of 10 million dollars. Castel took the plot from the state-owned Ziway Agricultural Development, located in the Oromia Regional State.

The new entrant, Ethio Grapes, is importing seedlings, which will be planted on 100hct of land. It is planning to produce edible grapes in its early phases and install a vineyard later on, Tesfalidet told Fortune.

Other investments developing vineyards are underway in the Rift Valley (Oromia Region and Dire Dawa) as similar climates show potential.

Luna Fruit, a subsidiary of Luna Export Slaughter Plc, has received 100hct of land in East Shoa Zone, near Koka, while Elfora has 15hct of land in Meki, and Almeta grabbed 100hct in Koka.

According to an agricultural expert, except for the edible grapes that Ziway produces for domestic consumption, they were not widely farmed in Ethiopia. The aggregate size of these plots is dwarfed by South Africa where there are 70,000hct of land covered by edible grape plantations; while in Egypt the same sector covers 40,000hct.

“The ongoing effort to invest in the industry would blossom like the new bud of a flower,” said the expert.

The companies now invested in edible grape farms in Ethiopia brought the hybrid from South Africa, and are expected to export their yields in three years.http://ethiopianflowerexport.com/tigray-state-to-get-200m-br-vineyard/

I'll see if I can find updated information. We already know that Luna Farms and Castel have already gotten at least their first harvests.


eta: from a quick search, Elfora has already exported its first batch in 2010 :okay:. Almeta also apparently is already in production. However, there is no available news on Ethio Grapes SC. I don't know if that means it never took off or they just don't have a web presence of any type.

Diddessa River, tributary of Abay (Nile) - dammed for irrigation

http://www.ethiotube.net/video/17584/Deddessa-River-the-largest-Contributor-to-The-Nile-to-be-dammed-for-Irrigation

^^ " the largest Contributor to The Nile" - hope Egypt won't make a big deal out of this.

Controversial Karuturi to Go Public, Here


Its managers plan to raise $12m dollars from prospective shareholders in Ethiopia


Karuturi Agro Products Plc, part of holding company Karuturi Glolabal Ltd, is planning to go public, floating 200,000 shares worth 1,000 Br each to local investors, once it gets the nod from its board of directors. The shares will be short-term, with a guaranteed annual return of 10pc in dividends.

Although the parent company, Banglore-based Karuturi Global, is publicly registered with 90,000 shareholders in India, this will be the first time, ever, that its Ethiopian subsidiary, Karuturi Agro, will float shares to the public, if all goes according to plan.

Karuturi Global had an annual turnover of over three billion dollars, while it made a net profit of 763 million dollars from its operations in 2011, earning its shareholders a 10pc return on their investments. Although Karuturi has a presence in other African countries, such as Kenya, none of its investments are highlighted in its portfolio beside those in Ethiopia.

It has a large presence in the country, having been promised 300,000ht of land from the government in Gambella Regional State, 721km southwest of the capital, in 2008. It has already leased 100,000ht of this land, for 50 years, which it will have to finish developing before it is given the remaining land from the government.

Karuturi also runs a commercial farm on an 11,000ht plot in Bako, a small town farther south from Ambo, in Oromia Regional State. Part of over 30,000ht reserved for the state, remaining unutilised since its nationalisation in the mid-1970s, Karuturi has already developed 2,300ht of this land, sowing maize.

The development it has undertaken in Gambella has increased the land that it has developed to 50,000ht, where close to half of this is ready for sowing maize.

The company has spent over 100 million dollars in procuring a variety of mechanised machinery from the United States, India, China, Israel, Korea, and Japan. It has also developed an irrigation system with 50km of canals, 50km of drainage, and 40km of dykes, pumping 22,000 litres a second of water from the Baro River.

[...]

Karuturi will have its first ever harvest of maize and sesame in April and September, 2012, according to Ramakrishna Karuturi, managing director of Karuturi Global Ltd.

[...]

“We need an additional 180 million dollars for further land development [in Ethiopia],” Karuturi told Fortune. “We have managed to secure most of the finance for our investment, borrowing from a consortium of banks, mostly in India and some from Mauritius and Ethiopia. However, we want to raise about 12 million dollars locally by selling shares.”

Although the company’s initial plan was to issue bonds in order to raise the 12 million dollars locally, it could not do so in Ethiopia, as the issuance of bonds is restricted to government financial institutions.

“We have been advised to sell shares, instead,” said Karuturi. “Our shares will be more sophisticated than common stock. We will offer the best that there is in the absence of a stock market in Ethiopia.”

The company will sell preferred shares at face value, which guarantees shareholders precedence on dividends, after all debts have been paid. For those who want to sell their shares, they can redeem up to five per cent of the value of the total shares floated twice a year, according to Karuturi.

read the rest @AddisFortune (http://www.addisfortune.com/Controversial%20Karuturi%20to%20Go%20Public,%20Here.htm)

A stock market is well-overdue now. How come we haven't heard of a single peep from the GoE on that matter?

So this is an opportunity for Ethiopians to own part of such a foreign company. I hope all the noisy critics will lap it up.

^^ I agree, defin. need a stock market soon

Conglomerate farming cotton in SNNP

Conglomerate Wide business Private Limited Company plans to set up a commercial farm on 1550hct of land. The corporation that owns metal supplier Artmetal jewelry and wrought iron company, the ferric belt processing and engineering factory and Hast Enterprise will make the investment under the newly formed Bura Agro Integrated company.
The farm is located in the Southern Nations and Nationalities and People’s Regional States (SNNPRs) in Sidama Zone, Loka Abaya woreda Bura kebele. The new company is named after that kebele.

Seid Hassen, General Manager of Wide Business said they have invested about 25 million birr already for the integrated agro-commercial irrigation farming on 428hct. It took the 428hct for a lease period of 45 years for a value of 70 birr per hectare.

The company has already allocated 28hct for horticultural activities and 400hct for cotton farming. They hope to start planting in February 2013. So far it has spent 10 million birr of the 25 million birr it had budgeted for the land.

Every year the company expects it will produce 30 quintals of cotton per hectare. This means that the farm should harvest 12,000 quintals of cotton and return 54 million birr in sales.

The company plans to supply to the cotton textile factories across Ethiopia. The Ethiopian government has tasked textile companies with fulfilling the Growth and Transformation Plan (GTP) targets of USD one billion worth of textile exports by 2015.

Seid further said on an additional 1100hct, which Bura plans to lease from the Southern Regional Government, it plans to plant vegetables. They hope it will yield 1000 quintals of tomatoes per hectare and 800 quintals of onions per hectare. The first yields are expected in April 2012.

They also have taken an additional 5,000sqm in Hawassa city 275Km south of Addis Ababa for a factory which would use the commercial farm’s products for agro-industrial purposes.

The farm’s cotton and future sesame by products will be processed into agro-industrial products like oil or cattle, fish feed and fertilizer.

read the rest @ Capital (http://capitalethiopia.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=541:conglomerate-farming-cotton-in-snnp-&catid=54:news&Itemid=27)

Ethiopia Coffee Exports May Rise at Least 7% This Year

(Corrects to show export data is for second half of fiscal year and not full year in story published on Feb. 16)

Feb. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Coffee exports from Ethiopia, Africa’s second-biggest shipper of the beans, may rise at least 7 percent this year, the Ethiopian Coffee Exporters’ Association said.

Exports are expected to be “no less” than 150,000 metric tons in the six months through July 7, the second half of Ethiopia’s fiscal year, Tesfaye Kenea, acting general manager of the association, said in an interview today in the capital, Addis Ababa.

Shipments in the first half totalled about 60,000 tons, 35,000 tons less than the same period a year earlier, Tesfaye said. Exports declined mainly because the crop was delayed for two months by a “lengthy” rainy season and because “the New York price is going down, but the Ethiopian price is not going down proportionally,” Tesfaye said.

Arabica coffee for May delivery has fallen 12 percent so far this year, and traded at $1.9920 a pound on ICE Futures U.S. at 9:43 a.m. in New York. Ethiopian buyers currently pay an average of $1.9883 per pound, according to data from the Ethiopia Commodity Exchange.

Ethiopia, Africa’s largest coffee producer, relies on the beans to generate about a third of its foreign-currency earnings. Exports of 196,119 tons brought in $841.7 million last year, according to the country’s Trade Ministry.

--Editors: Paul Richardson, Karl Maier.

Bloomberg (http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-02-23/ethiopia-coffee-exports-may-rise-at-least-7-this-year.html)

That's a decent amount of growth.

Who is the no 1 exporter? I thought it was Ethiopia?

^^ yeah thats weird, I guess they make a distinction between shipper (exporter) and producer :dunno:

they say we are Africas largest producer in the same article

I dont think we have a breweries thread yet, so I'll put this here:


Norton Rose acts on landmark Ethiopia private equity investment
Norton Rose has taken the key role on the largest private equity investment into Ethiopia to date.

The deal saw the UK law firm advise Duet Private Equity on its acquisition of a controlling interest in the country’s largest independent brewery business, Dashen Brewery.

While the value of the deal is modest in international terms, $90m (£57m) marks the largest-ever private equity investment into the market, with Norton Rose fielding a team led by City corporate partner Bayo Odubeko (pictured), while Dashen was advised by its in-house counsel.

The Ethiopian brewery sector saw a significant amount of M&A activity in 2011, with international drinks giants including Heineken and Diageo paying more than $400m (£252m) for three state-operated breweries.

The Duet investment will be used to increase the capacity at Dashen’s existing site in Gondar, Ethiopia and develop new production facilities in Addis Ababa.

Odubeko commented: “Ethiopia is an economy witnessing significant growth, and the increased M&A activity in Ethiopia is indicative of that. The 2011 M&A activity in the country’s brewing sector is 
a signal that consumer 
demand is healthy and continuing to grow.”

Duet Group is a UK asset management firm with over $2.7bn (£1.7bn) of assets under management, while Dashen, the maker of Dashen and Royal, is the only independent brewery in Ethiopia and has a market share close to 20%.

LegalWeek (http://www.legalweek.com/legal-week/news/2154432/norton-rose-acts-landmark-ethiopia-private-equity-investment)

That's a decent amount of growth.

Who is the no 1 exporter? I thought it was Ethiopia?
No. 1 exporter of coffee in the world is Brazil which export 2,249,010 tons which is the worlds 1/3 export.
2-vietnam---961,200 tons
3-Colombia---697,377 tons
4-Indonesia--676,475 tons
5-honduras--355,000 tons then became Ethiopia which in 2007 export 325,800 tons of coffee beans. So we are number one in Africa but number 6 in the world.

source wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffee

abinet,,,,,,Ethiopia is the third producer of coffee in the world now,,, check this news out

http://www.agrimoney.com/news/ethiopian-coffee-bonanza-lifts-world-output-hopes--4051.html

abinet,,,,,,Ethiopia is the third producer of coffee in the world now,,, check this news out
This is totaly conflicting news with the one Yosef posted above,which says Ethiopia's this year coffee export is going to be a mere 210,000 tons.The ICO says is going to be 588,000 tons(9.8million * 60 k.g bags)which makes it more than 2.5 folds and the income more than 2 billion dollars.So either the ICO exaggerates or our leaders are cheating some money here by reporting lower figure exports to the news media >(

documentary on MERET - the UN/WFP assisted soil & water conservation project that reportedly benefited 1.7 million in rural communities & rehabilitated 400,00 ha during 2007-2011 ....and is currently being scaled up to reach even more communities across the country...

http://www.wfp.org/videos/ethiopia-meret-changed-life

Biodiesel from Jatropha plant, new factory opens: http://www.ethiotube.net/video/18670/ETV-News--An-Ethiopian-Engineer-producing-bio-Diesel-from-local-plant

Peanut oil production begins in Harar


http://www.huginonline.de/ECO/logo.gif

Flora EcoPower (Ethiopia) Plc, soon to be re-named Acazis Agro-Industry Plc, a subsidiary of Acazis AG, a German company, listed on the Frankfurt Stock exchange, which grows castor plants, is to begin producing peanut oil from its farm near Harar.

The company will become one of the biggest peanut oil producers in the country next to Hamaressa Edible Oil SC, the state owned oil factory located just outside Harar. Currently, Hamaressa is the single largest state owned peanut oil producer factory in the country. The area surrounding Harar is known for its abundant supply of ground nuts. The new mill, Acazis Agro-Industry Plc’s oil mill in Fechatu, will begin the first test production runs in the coming months and expects larger scale production in Q/3 of 2012, according to Capital’s sources in the oil company. The oil mill that was erected a few years ago for the production of castor oil has four presses and additionally has a Hexane oil-pressing unit (chemical extrusion). Each press can produce around10,550 liters of edible oil per day.

The oil mill has undergone major renovation and has been adopted for edible oil production. The company officials will now focus entirely on the production of peanut oil instead of the non-food castor oil, because of the huge local market for edible oil. The oil mill factory was constructed at a cost of close to USD 8 million. In addition Swiss and German investors invested millions of dollars to renovate and refit the oil mill. The revenue from pressing the oil (including animal cake) per year is estimated to be around 5 million US-Dollars based on information obtained from Capital’s sources in the company.

The company is also cultivating castor beans on Government leased land, whereby around 1,000 hectares are already cultivated and additional cultivation of around 1,000-1,500 hectares is expected during this year. Furthermore, during the start of cultivating castor, significant funds were committed into the fields in Hararghe and currently around 160 local workers have found permanent jobs in the oil mill and on the fields.

read the rest@Capital (http://www.capitalethiopia.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=710:peanut-oil-production-begins-in-harar&catid=54:news&Itemid=27)

Officials discloses new data on leased farmland.




Posted by Daniel Berhane on Sunday, May 13, 2012 @ 4:36 am ·

An official from the Ethiopian Ministry of Agriculture disclosed new figures on the size and utilization of the agricultural land leased as well as the harvest and jobs from.

It is to be recalled that the Ministry disclosed last year 24 contract documents concluded with Ethiopians and Foreigners for the leasing of 350,099 Hectare (865,095 acres) land for commercial crops. Of which 285,012 is leased to 10 Foreign firms, while the rest is to 14 Ethiopian firms, including diaspora. (Read the summary and download the documents here.)

The new data provided by an official of the Ministry to a state-owned newspaper this month, however, show dramatic difference. According to the Ministry’s Public Relation and Communication Directorate Director, Tarekegn Tsige:


* 5284 investors have received about 2.2 million hectares (5,436,200 acres) of land in different parts of the country.

* Of which, 126 foreign investors have received 567, 651 hectares (1,402,666 acres), while the rest, about 1.7 million hectares, was allotted to Ethiopians.

* However, so far, only 372, 088 hectares( 919,429 acres), or 17.6 percent of the 2.2 million hectare land allotted, have been utilized to produce different farm products.

Interestingly, the size of utilized land (372, 088 hectares) is close to the figure (350,099 Hectare) that was so far provided as the total leased land.

It is also curious that the number of foreign investors ‘who have received land’ surged to 126, just a year after the Ministry released contractual documents with 10 foreign firms declaring that ‘these are the contracts inked so far’.

The official also said that:


* the investment has attracted 15 billion birr capital and created jobs for more than 2 million citizens.

* These farms have the capacity to produce and supply about 4. 7 million quintals of products to domestic and foreign market.

* The large scale farms are producing cotton, sisal, coffee, soyabean, fruits and inputs for biofuelproduction.

* More than 2 million quintals of sisal from about 253 thousand hectares, more than 824 quintals of cotton from about 40 thousand hectares, 52 thousand quintals of soyabean from 3 thousand hectares and more than 906 quintals of coffee from about 75 thousand hectares of land has so far been harvested.

* Many of the large scale farmlands leased to these investors are in Benshangul-Gumuz, Oromia, Gambella, Southern Nations, Nationalities and People (SNNP), Amhara and Tigray states.

With regard to land leased for the Horticulture sub-industry (the data above is only of land leased for commercial crops), the official said:


* a total of 81 foreign investors from the Netherlands, Germany, Israel, India, England, America, Saudi Arabia, Italy and domestic investors have currently leased 5954 hectares (14,712 acres) of land in different parts of the country to engage in the horticulture industry.

* they have, so far, utilized only 1,315 hectares(22 per cent) of land they have taken for the intended purpose.

He cited, as instances of land leased yet kept unproductive, a Netherlands flower company, Sher-Ethiopia, which leased 600 hectares of land but utilized only 227 hectares and another unnamed company which took about 1000 hectares and yet utilized not more than a tenth of it.

The official also remarked that:


‘The flower farms are located in the outskirts of major cities close to the capital and are creating job opportunities to thousands of citizens. However the impact of these farms on the employees health and the mechanism by which employees are compensated for health damages caused and the farms environmental impact still remains controversial and requires measures to be taken’.

Generally speaking, he claimed that ‘the investors have the right to supply 70 per cent and 30 per cent of their products to foreign and to domestic markets respectively’. This is probably based on a gentleman’s agreement, as there is no such obligation set in the contracts disclosed so far. Though, the government may issue a law imposing the export cap at any time.

3.6 million hectares land have been identified and registered in the Land Bank to be allotted for investors in ‘the coming few years’, according to the official. Moreover, ‘the government had planned to provide more than 1.2 million hectares of land during the first year(2010/11 of the GTP[the Growth and Transformation Plan] period. However, performance was far below the goal’, he said.

It should be noted that the country has about 74 mil. hectare (183 mil. acres) arable land of which about 14 million hectare is under cultivation, to date.

The official disclosed that ‘the Ministry has for the time being closed its window of license to clearly set the overall performance of investment on the land leased so far and pave a better scenario in the near future. It plans to commence soon and perform better in attracting more investors and enable them perform better’.

He downplayed criticisms that the land leasing has ‘brought negative impacts on the communities who live close to the farms’, claiming that ‘due emphasis has been given to make these investments free of adverse effect on the society who dwell close to them and this would continue in strengthened manner’.

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From Daniel Berhane Blog http://danielberhane.wordpress.com/2012/05/13/ethiopia-official-discloses-new-data-on-leased-farmlands/

Out of 5284 investors, 126 are foreigners, 5158 are Ethiopians.
Out of 2.2 million ha, 567,500 ha is leased to foreigners, 1.7 million ha is leased to Ethiopians.

:lol: @"foreign land grab"

This year crop production surpasses MoA plan for meher.



By Pawlos Belete
Thursday, 17 May 2012 08:45

The Ethiopian Central Statistical Agency (CSA) announced that Ethiopia harvested more than 218.5 million quintals of crops during the main harvesting season known as Mehir. The Ministry of Agriculture (MoA) had planned to harvest 205 million quintals of crops based on the forecast CSA made earlier this year.

This produce which comes from smallholder farms represents a 7.4 annual growth rate as compared to the same harvest season last year which amounts to 203.4 million quintals.

The agency took 2,273 sample plots across the country in order to scientifically calculate the crop yield, according to Samiya Zekariya, head of the agency.

“The Agency carried out its forecast based on its field experience. It took 2,273 sample areas across the country, incorporating around 68 thousand households.

“We gathered a harvest from two by two areas in the statistically representative sample size we have identified earlier. And then we weighted the result,” said the head of the agency while explaining how they came up with the figure to journalists last Monday in the agencies’ head quarters.

The smallholder farmers managed to cover more than 12.8 million hectares of land to produce the crops. The country harvested more than 188 million quintals including 23 million quintals of cereals, and seven million quintals of oil seeds. This is, on average, a productivity of 18 quintals per hectare.

The total area cultivated this Mehir season has increased by almost one million hectares as compared to last season.

Though the statistical information gathered portrayed a growth in the overall crop production, the contribution of cereals and oilseeds was the highest. Cereal contributed more than 18 percent and oilseeds 15 percent.

“The shift in the growth of cereals and oilseeds as compared to major food crops clearly indicates that famers are following the foot steps of markets incentives. They prefer to produce higher valued crops,” she explained.

The Mehir season agricultural produce covers about 90 percent of the countries’ crop production while the remaining 10 percent occurs during the Belg season. This year’s Belg rain came a month later than the usual time, which is March. This has cast a cloud of fear among humanitarian organizations operating in the area of drought relief.

However, CSA is hopeful that the country will collect more than 18 million quintals of crops from the Belg season both from small holder farmers and that of commercial farms. Both parties are expected to collect nine million quintals from this troubled season. If the expectation of the CSA is materialized, the annual crop production will swell to 237 million quintals.



http://capitalethiopia.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1031:crop-production-surpasses-moa-plan-for-mehir&catid=35:capital&Itemid=27