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LEGACY Businesses in a Liminal Space

LEGACY Businesses in a Liminal Space

At first light in Addis Abeba's Qality District, the smell of freshly roasted Yirgacheffe beans drifts into the yeasty haze from Shoa Bakery's ovens, a blend that sums up Ethiopia's family firms. Such outfits are scarce everywhere, yet in Ethiopia, r...

Apr 19 , 2025

Fortune News

Banks Warn as Crackdown on Loans Triggers Fears of Toxic Debt Surge

Key Takeaways The National Bank of Ethiopia has introduced a new loan classification system, imposing stringent grading requirements on banks. Banks feel the directive's timeline is unrealis...

Apr 19 , 2025

Money Market Watch

Birr Wobbles While Central Bank Whispers as Young Banks Break the Old Rules

Key Takeaways: The National Bank of Ethiopia's currency auctions emphasise efforts to stabilise a volatile financial environment. A split in strategy between newer and established banks reveal...

Apr 19 , 2025

News Analysis

Amhara Bank Grows Fast with Slow Dividends

Key Takeaways: Amhara Bank's agile growth and strategic credit approaches have positioned it prominently within two years of operation. A remarkable turnaround in profitability was driven by...

Apr 19 , 2025

Latest Updates

Auditors Under Fire as City Officials Hunts Billions in Lost Taxes

Key Takeaways: Over 800 auditors and accountants are under scrutiny in Addis Abeba, accused o...

Apr 19 , 2025

Deposit Insurance Fund Faces Its First Test

Key Takeaways: EDIF has collected 5.2 billion Br in premiums, displaying its role in fortify...

Apr 23 , 2025

Universities Flunk Their Own Test as Confidence Wanes

Key Takeaways: The national exit exam showed a 27pc overall pass rate, prompting concerns abo...

Apr 19 , 2025

Agenda

A Holiday of Uneasy Choices

Takeaways: The Addis Abeba market faces logistical challenges with fewer livestock trucks arriving compared to previous years. Rising costs affect not only meat but also entire holiday budgets, with transportation and checkpoint fees contri...

Apr 19 , 2025

Trenches of Tax Turmoil

Key Takeaways: Merkato's bustling trade shows signs of a slowdown, manifesting deeper economic anxieties affecting merchants and shoppers alike. Trade...

Apr 13 , 2025

FLUSHED WITH TROUBLE

Key Takeaways Addis Abeba residents face sudden and severe fines for waste disposal violations, demonstrating the gap between rapid urban expansion and inf...

Apr 6 , 2025

OPEN FOR AD

Editorial

Overseas Job Push Evokes Hopes at Home, Hardship Abroad

Mufariat Kamil, the minister of Labour & Skills, recently told Parliament that her Ministry had created 3.4 million new domestic jobs in nine months of the current fiscal year. She also touted an annual target of sending 833,333 workers overseas...

Apr 20 , 2025

Officials Bank on Student Service to Patch a Fractured Country

The federal government will soon require one year of national service from university students, which education officials have dubbed "Ethiopia University Service." Four-year students will serve after their third year, and five-year students after their fourth...

Apr 13 , 2025

Cheap Power Lures Bitcoin Miners. But Millions Wait for a Lightbulb Moment

Last week, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), part of the World Bank Group, announced a 100-million-dollar debt financing package for Raxio Group, a major data-centre operator in sub-Saharan Africa. Over the next three years, Raxio plans to use these...

Apr 6 , 2025

Exclusive Interview

Legacy Businesses in a Liminal Era

At first light in Addis Abeba's Qality District, the smell of freshly roasted Yirgacheffe beans drifts into the yeasty haze from Shoa Bakery's ovens, a blend that sums up Ethiopia's family firms. Such outfits are scarce everywhere, yet in Ethiopia, roughly 40pc are run by second-generation heirs and...

Apr 19 , 2025

The Roast of Resilience Brews in Bloodline

When her father died suddenly in 2008, Heleanna Georgalis found herself at the helm of Moplaco Trading Plc, a venerable coffee company founded in 1897 during Emperor Menelik's reign. Thrust into leadership amid profound grief, she had to steer the uncharted...

Apr 19 , 2025

Ink, Blood and Family Bonds Shape a Quiet Printing Empire

Chamber Printing House Plc was established in 1965 by Asfaw Tefera and Tiruwork Mengistu. Asfaw, then a diplomat at the Ethiopian Embassy in Lagos, Nigeria, spent his spare time in a friend's printery and caught the printing bug. With a 4,000 Br loan he set...

Apr 19 , 2025

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Viewpoint

The Global South Will Pay for Trump's Trade War

US President Donald Trump's sweeping tariffs have unleashed economic chaos, roiling stock and bond markets and triggering panic around the world, especially in lower-income countries that rely heavily on exports to the United States (US). The result could be an entirely manufactured global recession, with the developing world bearing the brunt. The brief calm in financial markets following Trum...

Apr 20 , 2025

Sustainability in an Unstable World

As the world becomes increasingly unstable, with the security that many people took for granted called into question, climate change, once viewed as the defining challenge of our time, has been sidelined by geopolitics, which has brought issues such as rearmam...

Apr 19 , 2025

Trump, Tariffs, and the Dollar's Fate

With the Trump Administration imposing "insane" tariffs on the rest of the world, many commentators are worried about the problem of “sane-washing”: imputing cogent rationales to policies that have none. Such naive punditry, they argue, distracts from the...

Apr 13 , 2025

My Opinion

They Call Her "Family". But They Pay Her in Silence

Before dawn breaks, they are at work. They stoke charcoal fires before the call to prayer, setting meals in motion so the rest of the household can wake to warm food. By the time school bags are packed and the gates open, many domestic workers have already logged half a shift, though no one offers them overtime. These are the nannies, maids, and guards who power the country's middle and upper c...

Apr 20 , 2025

Classrooms Shouldn't Become Coffins for Dreams

A country where over one third of its population is under the age of 30, Ethiopia faces a quiet crisis in education, threatening the future of millions. Schools, intended as places of growth, are increasingly becoming necropoleis of potential. Measures taken t...

Apr 13 , 2025

The Youth Chase Riches That Never Come

It starts innocently enough, usually with a message from an old classmate: “Hey, I've an exciting opportunity for you! Financial freedom, passive income, entrepreneurship. DM me for details.” Soon, we could find ourselves in a crowded conference hall, l...

Apr 6 , 2025

Featured

From Cassette, CD Dreams to Cloud Streams

Key Takeaways Kuku Sebsibie's transition to digital singles represents a shift in the domestic music industry. The Ethiopian streaming market is projected to grow, with revenues expected to reach 7.1 million dollars by 2027. Established artists benefit more from digital platforms, while mid-tier musicians face a financial crunch. The youth and the diaspora play crucial roles in the digital engagement and consumption of Ethiopian music. Artists like Kuku are leveraging new me...

Apr 19 , 2025

Commentaries

How Should Africa Respond to Foreign-Aid Cuts?

A global storm is gathering, and Africa is directly in its path. Under President Donald Trump, the United States has frozen 40 billion dollars in USAID funding, slashing 83pc of grants. European donor countries are also drastically cutting their foreign-aid commitments, signalling a broader shift in priorities. The devastating effects are already being felt across Africa, particularly in sectors like healthcare, education, and social services, which have long relied on external support. For d...

Apr 19 , 2025

News Analysis

Amhara Bank Grows Fast with Slow Dividends

Key Takeaways: Amhara Bank's agile growth and strategic credit approaches have positioned it prominently within two years of operation. A remarkable turnaround in profitability was driven by a 137.1pc increase in interest income. With over 310 branches mobilising deposits, the Bank's expansion strategy showed its market influence. Despite high operational costs, the Bank's robust capital and focus on diversification signalled preparedness for future challenges. Amhara Bank...

Apr 19 , 2025

Delicate Number

333,000,000,000

The number of emails sent each day across the world.

Apr 19 , 2025

Fineline

Leaders of the National . . .

Leaders of the National Election Board are in a charm offensive mood, of a sort. Last week, they organised a rare tour for members of the media, showcasing what polling stations will look like during the upcoming national elections; and they took the...

Oct 3 , 2020

Verbatim

"Political dialogue has not yet begun."

Debretsion Gebremichael (PhD), chair of the TPLF, has urged Samad Alade (Mj. Gen.), newly appointed to lead the African Union mission monitoring the Pretoria peace accord, to help launch talks on the issues that provoked the 2020 civil war in northern Ethiopia.

View From Arada

Addis's Easter Art Bonanza

Passing through the grand foyer of the Sheraton Addis, I expected “The Art of Ethiopia” to be a premium event. But what I saw exceeded all expectations. Hundreds of people, mostly young...

Apr 20 , 2025

Films Review

Nope

Few would have imagined that the Peele in Key & Peele, a show on MTV's Comedy Central, would become a world-class director reminiscent of Alfred Hitchcock and David Fincher. There is a sketch from Key & Peele, titled Town Hall Audience Member, one of the funniest outputs of the show, where Jordan Peele shows some promise as he acts entirely with his eyes to peak comedic effect. Other than that, at least to this author's eyes, there is nothing to indicate cinematic genius or even a great...

Sep 17 , 2022

RRR: PEAK OF BOLLYWOOD, FOR BETTER OR WORSE

Bollywood has finally peaked. The sentimentalism, chirpy musical numbers, physics-defying fight scenes and aggressively cheesy romantic plots have all come into their own in RRR, one of the biggest Bollywood hits in recent memory to gain an international audience. I would normally object to individual elements of the movie, including its ludicrous storyline and plot holes. But the way they have come together is strangely fascinating. RRR, which is short for “Rise, Roar, Revolt" and must be...

Sep 10 , 2022

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Fortune Video

Sunday With Eden

The Rose-Tinted Trap of Nostalgia

In almost every conversation, I hear people mention “the good old days.” The phrase slips in like a sigh, usually when someone's facing difficulty. It acts as comfort, a way to escape the discomfort of the present by romanticizing the past. People often reach for nostalgia when life feels overwhelming. It's a mental shortcut to a time that seemed simpler, safer, or more joyful. But sometime...

Apr 19 , 2025

Grace Over Grind

Over the weekend, I attended a women's gathering that quietly reshaped how I think about balance, ambition, motherhood, and the kind of life I want to build. The speaker did not deliver a typical keynote. She simply told her story – and in doing so, taught m...

Apr 13 , 2025

Breaking Bread, Sharing Hearts

Almost a year ago, my husband and I sat in the living room of a dear friend who had just suffered an unimaginable loss. She had lost a very young loved one, and the weight of her grief was overwhelming. In her mourning, she sought solace in the presence of fri...

Apr 6 , 2025

Life Matters

The Weight of Things

That sudden, almost irrational urge to deep clean the house always seems to arrive unannounced. Everything is calm one moment; the next, there is a compulsion to haul out mops and buckets like a military operation. That was the mood the other day – driven by the kind of motivation that vanishes if not acted upon quickly. The mission was clear: dive into the mess, restore order, and bask in the g...

Apr 19 , 2025

The Awkward Art of Saying Hello

Living side by side with others – sharing walls, staircases, even the same unreliable electricity – should make greetings feel natural. A simple “hello” seems like the least we could offer one another. And yet, I often find myself hesitating. Despite m...

Apr 13 , 2025

Showers Are Optional, Guilt Is Not

It's funny how life throws your pre-baby notions right out the window. I vividly remember joking with a friend, back in my carefree days, about how toddlers don't need a huge wardrobe for those first three years. We reasoned, rather naively, that mothers deser...

Apr 6 , 2025

Radar

Coffee Exports Bring in $1.5B in Third Quarter

Ethiopia has earned 1.5 billion dollars from coffee exports over the nine months of the fiscal year. The country had set a target to earn a little over a billion dollars by exporting 201,959tns of coffee during the same period. According to Adugna Debella (PhD), director general of the Ethiopian Coffee & Tea Authority, the export strategy continues to focus on major international markets, w...

Apr 19 , 2025

Coffee Exports Bring in $1.5B in Third Quarter

Ethiopia has earned 1.5 billion dollars from coffee exports over the nine months of the fiscal year. The country had set a target to earn a little over a billion dollars by exporting 201,959tns of coffee during the same period. According to Adugna Debella (PhD), director general of the Ethiopian Coffee & Tea Authority, the export strategy continues to focus on major international markets, w...

Apr 19 , 2025

In Picture

CULTURAL ECHOES

A minibus at the Stadium Taxi terminal carries a stack of leather‑skinned drums bound for holiday celebrations. Carved by hands that honour generations, the kebero's deep rumble evokes joyous moments and ancient rhythms. Its voice, like laughter among friends, seems to make the earth itself tremble in celebration. Together, these drums speak a language older than words—a living rhythm that uni...

Apr 19 , 2025

ALL ABOARD!

A sleek, eco‑smart bus glides into Mexico Square, its digital displays and silent engine a playful jab at the worn vehicles it replaces—battle‑scarred from years of ferrying passengers and weathering carelessness. In a world racing toward intelligent, green technology, getting people to sync up still feels like boarding an old bus: everyone's on their own schedule. Yet here's a promise of ch...

Apr 19 , 2025