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Sep 13 , 2025 . By NAHOM AYELE and YITBAREK GETACHEW

Student Tax ID Push Triggers Logjam

The yellow flush of Aday Abeba flowers has returned to Addis Abeba, heralding the arrival of the Ethiopian New Year. In streets criss-crossed by horse-drawn carriages and honking minibuses, the familiar sounds of "Krar" and "Mesenqo" mingle with the chatter of families bargaining for holiday chicken...

Sep 7 , 2025 . By AMANUEL BEKELE

As Holidays Near, Addis Abeba's Markets Thrum with Hope, Hardship

As the holiday nears, the markets of Addis Abeba thrum with anticipation and anxiety. In the capital's crowded stalls, tradition collides with economic reality as families brace for another festive season marked by spiralling costs and tightening budgets. At Shola Market, one of the city's busiest hubs, the air is thick with the sound of haggling. Vendors perched behind tables stacked with everything from butter and honey to chicken and spices call out to the growing stream of shoppers, all intent on piecing together a holiday meal without breaking the bank. For Emebet Worku, 65, the pre...


Aug 30 , 2025 . By RUTH BERHANU

School Bells Ring as Wallets Snap Shut

The rainy season was losing its grip on Addis Abeba. Patches of pale sky opened between bruised clouds, and streets that had been rivers only days earlier now carried the damp smell of wet soil. Children headed for the new school year traded bright notebooks while showing off crisp uniforms. For many households, the return to classes felt like a reset. For Meseret Assefa, it felt like a tightening knot. Her twins were starting fourth grade at a private school, and she refused to let poverty dislodge the promise she had made to them. “Education,” she said, “will not be among the thi...


Aug 9 , 2025

FOREX MARKET SQUEEZES TEST REFORM NERVE

The hum of Addis Abeba's import hubs has faded to a fretful murmur as importers claim their banks demand to know how long their cash would idle before signing off on letters of credit. The message, they say, is clear: try the parallel market. Their frustration is the front-line reality of the foreign-exchange liberalisation. A year after the National Bank of Ethiopia (NBE) scrapped its peg to the dollar, the policy remains mired in uneven auctions, persistent shortages, and a widening gap between official and street market rates. The government's policy reform credibility, and its billion-doll...

Agenda

Aug 23 , 2025

Torn Tarps, Fractured Hope

Around dusk during the first week of August this year, dark clouds blew over the craggy ridges of North Wollo, in Amhara Regional State, where more than 8,500 people squeezed into the makeshift Jara c...

Aug 17 , 2025

Slow Connectivity Undermines Freelance Boom, Outsourcing Ambitions

On a weekday afternoon in Addis Abeba, when remote workers were buried in trans-Atlantic calls and racing to meet deadlines, software developer Oliyad Takele sat in front of a frozen screen. For four...

Aug 10 , 2025

Floated Currency Promise Meets Hard Reality

The hum of Addis Abeba's import hubs was muted by frustration as Sultan Yusuf found out last week. He has spent more than five years importing cars and chemicals.  He pulled back in his chair mid...

Aug 3 , 2025

Deluge Defies Drainage, Devours Addis Abeba

getachew Shiferaw felt the danger before he saw it. On July 24, 2025, the midday sky above Addis Abeba darkened, and rain began to hammer the capital in sheets. A manager of the OLA gas station café...

Jul 27 , 2025

Burned by a Backdoor Tax Shock

The haze that lingers over Addis Abeba at dawn did little to hide the worry on AlemDemeke's face when she left the Ethiopian Electric Utility (EEU) branch in the Haile Garment neighbourhood. The 4...

Jul 20 , 2025

New Tax Code Draws Cheers from Officials, Cries from the Streets

During a soft and steady rain that soaked the narrow lanes around Ghana Street, near St. Uriel Church on the edge of the Uriel School campus, pedestrians shuffled along under umbrellas, hoods, or bare...

Jul 13 , 2025

Brewing Trouble as Tella Bars Go Dry

The sweet-sour scent of "tella" still lingered in the cramped compound off Tunisia Street, close to Addisu Gebeya, even though the drink itself is gone. Days ago, 200Lts of the home-brewed beer were p...

Jul 6 , 2025

When Pepper Burns the Purse

The late-morning sun cuts through Addis Abeba's usual haze and lands on Haile Garment, an industrious pocket of the capital's Nifas Silk-Lafto District where sewing workshops crowd narrow lanes. Fr...

Jun 29 , 2025

As School Fees Soar in Addis, Families Choose Between Education, Survival

Late June in Addis Abeba brings its first curtain of rain, a grey veil that slows the minibuses and muffles the usual din of the capital. It is the season when schools close, children tumble into the...

Jun 21 , 2025

Addis Abeba's Messy Taxi Overhaul Leaves Riders Waiting, Veterans Sidelined

Around 5:00pm, a time when most civil servants spill out of office towers and scramble for rides home, Mexico Square was oddly hushed. On Mozambique Street, in the Genet Hotel area, only a few batt...

Jun 15 , 2025

A Promise Signed, A Silence Kept

Mekdes Nebro remembers the moment silence crept into her life. Raised in Merhabete, a hill town in North Shewa of the Amhara Regional State, she imagined university as a bright step forward, crowded l...

Jun 8 , 2025

A Crisis Hidden in Plain Sight

Meseret Mulle rises before dawn in the crowded quarter around Golagol Tower, waking her two sons, aged 13 and eight, in the single “kebele” house they share. At 35, she cleans homes in Gerji, a tw...

May 31 , 2025

Elite Schools Raise Fees Sharply as Parents Cry Foul Over Legal Wrangling

Parents at Flipper International School received a jolt on May 23, 2025, when a letter confirmed that next year's “Category 1” tuition will increase to 178,558 Br, a 76,525 Br leap equivalent to r...

May 24 , 2025

When the Rains Come for the Poor

Yohannes Geta spent two years watching the Wyen Amba River trickle past his home in Bole District, Wereda 11, on the southeastern outskirts of the capital. The river sometimes carried soil and constru...

May 17 , 2025

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...

May 11 , 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 broken in a single July afternoon. The mother...


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In Climate Talks, Africa Mortgages Tomorrow Simply to Survive Today


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In Climate Talks, Africa Mortgages Tomorrow Simply to Survive Today

At its launch in Nairobi two years ago, the Africa Climate Summit was billed as the forum...

Editorial | Sep 13 , 2025

Digital Payments Reshape Economy While Service Workers Lose Out

The way the Birr moves is changing, and with it, habits that have shaped daily life for ge...

Featured | Sep 14 , 2025 . By NAHOM AYELE

Student Tax ID Push Triggers Logjam

The yellow flush of Aday Abeba flowers has returned to Addis Abeba, heralding the arrival...

Agenda | Sep 13 , 2025 . By NAHOM AYELE and YITBAREK GETACHEW

Monument to National Ambition, Geopolitical Agency

The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), Africa's largest hydroelectric power project,...

Fortune News | Sep 15 , 2025 . By AMANUEL BEKELE