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MILK SUPPLY DISRUPTIONS DRIVE PRICE SURGE


The soaring price of milk is becoming increasingly unaffordable, uncovering a deepening crisis in the dairy industry. Households are feeling the pinch as prices recently jumped by 20pc, leaving families struggling to meet basic nutritional needs, par...

May 17 , 2025


Fortune News

Sovereign Fund Dips Into T-Bills Stirring Markets Long Left Dormant

Ethiopian Investment Holdings (EIH) has stepped into the Treasury Bill (T-bill) market for the first time, investing nearly seven billion Birr, marking a notable shift for commercial entities in the p...

May 17 , 2025

Money Market Watch

Central Bank Tweaks Rates While the Birr Holds Its Breath

The foreign exchange market had a telling week, and the story was all in the margins. Last week, the Central Bank nudged its official cash-buying rate from 130.47 Br to 132.17 Br for a dollar, a small...

May 17 , 2025

News Analysis

Siinqee Bank Accelerates Growth, Struggles to Convert Scale into Profit

Siinqee Bank has burst confidently from microfinance trenches into the competitive commercial banking industry, posting an impressive profit surge that outshone many peers. Its net profit jumped by 8...

May 11 , 2025


Latest Updates

New Pharmacy Rules Promise Order But Threaten Survival of Small Businesses

In a sweeping move that has triggered applause from regulators and alarm among small operators, the...

May 17 , 2025


Addis Abeba's New Policy Makes Landlords Tax Watchdogs

A new measure from the Addis Abeba Revenue Bureau (AARB) makes commercial landlords partly accountab...

Federal Tax Tribunal to Extend Wings to Regional Capitals

The Federal Tax Appeals Commission is preparing to open regional branch offices next year in the Amh...

May 17 , 2025







Agenda

Milk Prices Soar as Dairy Chain Buckles Under Strain

Azeb Asamen sat in the modest living room of her small home near Haile Garment Square, in the southern outskirts of Addis Abeba, her brow furrowed as she stared at the empty milk container beside her. At 42, and with four children to feed, she felt r...

May 17 , 2025


Debt Deadlines Test the Promise of Addis Abeba's Makeover

Tsiriha Biru, 45, had never imagined that her rhythm of life in Adissu Gebeya, a northern Addis Abeba market hub she had known for three decades, could be broke...

May 11 , 2025


They Worked for Decades, Now They Struggle to Survive

In Addis Abeba's crowded southern quarter, the hum of traffic fades behind SarisAboChurch, where a narrow alley leads to a mud-plastered compound. Inside, 68-ye...

May 4 , 2025







Editorial

Researchers Churn Out Studies by the Ton. Quality Checks are Causality

Ethiopia pours more than three billion Birr a year into academic research, yet too much of that money is vanishing into a sinkhole of low-quality work. Since 2001, when the country contributed a mere 261 Scopus-indexed (the world's largest databas...

May 17 , 2025


Ethiopia's Aid Reckoning Demands a Homegrown Rescue Plan

Federal legislators recently summoned Shiferaw Teklemariam (PhD), head of the Disaster Risk Management Commission (DRMC), to explain a new bill designed to streamline the country's response to emergencies. A defining part of the bill is the introduction of a n...

May 10 , 2025

When Pension Funds Nap Inflation Steals the Blanket

Pensioners have learned, rather painfully, the gulf between a figure on a passbook and a loaf of bread. A monthly allowance of 5,000Br (about 38 dollars at last week's weighted average rate) used to keep senior retirees in groceries, rent, and a little dignity...

May 3 , 2025







Exclusive Interview

Germany Champions Reforms While Industrial Model Faces Global Stress Test

Jens Hanefeld, Germany's envoy in Addis Abeba, touched down last September with a resume that mixes three decades of diplomacy, a decade running Volkswagen's global lobbying shop and the trained eye of a historian. Serving as ambassador to Ethiopia and Berlin's permanent representative to the Africa...

May 17 , 2025


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 40p...

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







Viewpoint

The World Doesn't Need Another Climate Fund

Brazil has announced plans to launch a 125 billion dollar fund for the protection of tropical forests. It is a key element of the country's plan to ensure the success of the next United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP-30), which Brazil will host. But, at a time when some of the world's wealthiest economies are slashing their foreign-aid budgets, and the United States is turning its back...

May 18 , 2025


Mutually Assured Development Destruction

Toward the end of the ancient Indian epic, the Mahabharata, Krishna's Yadava clan self-destructs. Many dark omens presage their downfall: nature behaves erratically, and pests multiply. Sin, deception, and violence proliferate, eroding trust and solidarity. Cl...

May 17 , 2025

Mothers' Cry Echoes Across Borders as the Emirates Step In

Where traditional birth attendants light a small lamp to guide expectant mothers through the dim corridor, in a country that has cut its under-five mortality rate in half over the last two decades, the fragile progress can be undone by a shortage of clean wate...

May 10 , 2025


My Opinion

A Typo Takes Five Days, a National ID to Fix

A woman on an adjacent white plastic chair suggested, half-joking, that we should start paying rent there. It was my third morning at the District Revenues Bureau. By then, a silent community of taxpayers had formed, bound by the shuffle from wooden bench to plastic seat in a queue that refused to shrink. The errand was supposed to be simple. I was there to correct a typo in my Taxpayer Identif...

May 17 , 2025


Soaring Rents, Speculative Land Deals Chokes Addis Abeba

When the first rays of sunlight hit Addis Abeba, they illuminate two very different realities. In one, glass towers and sleek condos rise from the skyline, telltales to a city on the move. In the other, rows of tin-roofed homes huddle in narrow alleyways, t...

May 10 , 2025

Minimum Wage Promises Remain Unfulfilled as Employees Toil for Less

Six years after the labour law called for a Wage Board and nearly a century after the country first toyed with wage setting, the floor that would protect millions of low-income workers is still missing. The Confederation of Ethiopian Trade Unions (CETU) has...

May 3 , 2025






Featured

Curtain Falls on a Capital Stage as Theatre Fights for Its Life

The balcony at the National Theatre, on Churchill Avenue, used to fill up days in advance on a Friday night. Last week, only about 50 patrons clustered in the front rows while dozens of empty seats echoed their applause. Audiences have dropped from 500 or even 1,000 people to only 80 to 200 people a show. Rahel Teshome, who heads the theatre department, remembered the sharp falloff began after the COVID-19 shutdowns and has yet to reverse, even as the theatre house stages more plays than ever...

May 4 , 2025


Commentaries

Demographic Dividend Drains Away When Youth Policy Drifts

In contemporary sub-Saharan Africa, young people drive the economy. Nearly two-thirds of the population in many countries is under age 35. The share is even higher in Ethiopia, at roughly 70pc. Twenty years ago, enrolling in university almost guaranteed a job in the public or private sectors. Today, that promise has evaporated. Young graduates find themselves adrift, with no clear policies or programs to chart their futures. The existing Ethiopian Youth Policy, drafted in 2004, pledged to emp...

May 17 , 2025


News Analysis

Siinqee Bank Accelerates Growth, Struggles to Convert Scale into Profit

Siinqee Bank has burst confidently from microfinance trenches into the competitive commercial banking industry, posting an impressive profit surge that outshone many peers. Its net profit jumped by 82.7pc during the financial year ending June 30, 2024, displaying a rapid growth trajectory that few of its generational counterparts could match. Nevertheless, while its deposit base grew explosively, Siinqee Bank's lending operations faced substantial limitations, mainly due to the National Bank...

May 11 , 2025


Delicate Number

608

The number of students expected to take the secondary school leaving exam in this academic year.

May 17 , 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

"It's a criminal enterprise."

Getachew Reda, former chief administrator of the Interim Regional Administration of Tigray (IRAT), in a long and two-part interview with Fana Broadcasting, characterised the senior leadership of the TPLF, from which he has been disgruntled lately.



View From Arada

Moonlight in Zoma

A leisurely Sunday afternoon at a coffee shop near Mekanisa Abo Mazoria turned into a spontaneous adventure. Over coffee, my friend mentioned a nearby park often described as a nature lover's paradise, Zoma Museum. I had heard about it in...

May 17 , 2025




Fortune Video




Sunday With Eden

Drowning in Someone's Storm

Friendship is supposed to be a two-way street; a bond built on mutual respect, trust, and support. But when that dynamic shift, and the friendship begins to resemble unpaid emotional labor, it leaves you drained and quietly resentful. A few years ago, I found myself caught in such relationships; friendships that masqueraded as closeness but were, in truth, one-sided dependencies. Three years la...

May 17 , 2025


Raising Builders, Not Spenders

Raising Builders, Not Spenders Over lunch recently, my husband and I sat with a young friend from one of Ethiopia's wealthiest families. She was launching her own business, an ambitious venture, not a vanity project, despite having access to a family fortun...

May 10 , 2025

Is Struggle the Secret Ingredient in Parenting?

In an age obsessed with convenience and instant gratification, parenting stands at a crossroads. Many of us, with the best intentions, try to smooth every bump in our children's path; solving problems before they arise, shielding them from discomfort, and givi...

May 3 , 2025


Life Matters

Gambling on Survival

Sometimes it feels like the world has turned into a high-stakes lottery. The kind where everyone is expected to become a millionaire overnight, and if that magic does not happen by tomorrow, a quiet disappointment settles in. It is heavy, and it lingers. Well-meaning voices from an older generation still offer advice: “Just save up for a down payment,” or “Take out a car loan and build cr...

May 17 , 2025


When a Comment Cuts Deep, Thank the Shadow

There are moments when a comment from a friend, partner, or colleague strikes a nerve, not with casual irritation but with a jolt of anger or defensiveness. The instinct may be to argue, dismiss, or counterattack. Yet beneath the immediate emotional surge, the...

May 10 , 2025

Less Stuff, More Life

There is a little thrill that comes with buying something new, the excitement of having the means, walking out with a bag in hand. That moment can feel validating, even joyful. It is easy to get swept up, purchasing not just what is needed, but whatever catche...

May 3 , 2025





Radar

Dashen Bank Rolls Out Mobile Payment Solution

Dashen Bank has introduced a new digital payment service that allows customers to pay for fuel with ease using the Dashen Super mobile app. The service was officially launched on May 13 and is now available at every fuel stations. According to the bank, the Dashen Super app enables users to make payments in just three clicks, offering a fast and convenient alternative to traditional payment met...

May 17 , 2025


Dashen Bank Rolls Out Mobile Payment Solution

Dashen Bank has introduced a new digital payment service that allows customers to pay for fuel with ease using the Dashen Super mobile app. The service was officially launched on May 13 and is now available at every fuel stations. According to the bank, the Dashen Super app enables users to make payments in just three clicks, offering a fast and convenient alternative to traditional payment met...

May 17 , 2025

In Picture

MEMORY CRUMBS

A lone worker watches as an excavator tears through the remains of a school in Kebena, cleared to make way for a riverside development project. Once alive with the sounds of classrooms and the rhythm of learning, the building now crumbles quietly. Just like that, its final chapter is written in dust and debris...

May 17 , 2025


DUST DANCERS

Under the midday sun on a busy Bole sidewalk, a group of street cleaners in bright uniforms pause with their brooms in hand—chatting, sweeping, and blending into the city's rhythm as they quietly shape its face, one piece of litter at a time...

May 17 , 2025