Tadesse Tesema, a 60-year-old pensioner from Aqaqi Qality district, has a lot to complain about when it comes to cooking oil.

He says the price of oil is too high for him to buy it in the open market. As a result, he is obliged to get his ration by shopping at a government-organised union in his wereda, which distributes edible oil under a state subsidy program.

The problem with that option is that the union shops are often out of stock.

For Tadesse, a father of six, and many other residents of the city like him, this has been a daunting challenge for the past couple of years. The national average per capita consumption of cooking oil is 8.9lt of oil  a year.

“It may take more than a month and a half of waiting to get my ration from the union,” he said. “When we finish the oil we get from the union, we have to buy it in the open market, which is more expensive.”

Tadesse receives his subsidised oil from the union in his district where Yeayneshet Kasahun works as an acting manager.

The union itself is facing the same challenge, as it is not receiving its expected allocation of cooking oil in response to the demand of the district, according to Yeayneshet.

“We get 11,000 containers of three-litre palm oil to distribute to 15,000 households,” she said.

When customers are turned down at the union, they assume the associations are hoarding the products, according to Etaferaw Abebe, a member of a consumer union near Gotera.

This is not the first time that the country has been hit by cooking oil shortages, and the government has been devising ways to remedy the problem.

One of the government's schemes to alleviate the problem facing low and middle-income citizens has been to subsidise basic consumer products, such as sugar, wheat and cooking oil, and distribute them through the union shops at lower costs, according to Wondimu Filate, communications director at the Ministry of Trade & Industry.

In 2011, in a bid to stabilise the market and deal with the supply problem, the government banned private companies from importing palm oil, allowing only government-owned firms to import it.

The policy was readjusted in 2015 to allow selected private companies to import palm oil. The companies were selected based on their capacity and performance in the market, according to Wondimu.

Ten companies, including five private firms, one governmental organisation and four endowments were authorised to import the commodity mainly from Indonesia, India, China, Dubai and the Netherlands. These companies import 40 million litres of palm oil a month and distribute it to the unions across the country.

The government assists these importers by facilitating foreign currency, granting duty-free privileges and helping them in the distribution of the commodities.

These companies import more than 350 million tonnes of subsidised palm oil annually, according to data from the Central Statistics Agency. Yet this does not meet the demand and consumers are left complaining like Tadesse.

Even though the country has an annual production potential of more than 784,809tn of oilseeds, it remains unrealised mainly due to challenges in the value chain.

There are also over 1,000 companies that are registered by the Ministry of Trade & Industry to process oil in the country, and over 912 companies import cooking oil. However, these companies are not allowed to import palm oil, which is consumed by the majority of people due to its affordability.

Three-quarters of all imported goods enter Ethiopia through Modjo Dry Port, the largest in the country with a capacity of holding 14,000 shipping containers at a time.

A 20-foot container can carry 1,056 cartons of three-litre oil jugs or 1,020 boxes of five-litre jugs. For 20-litre and 25-litre jerry cans, that number is 1,039 cans and 882 cans, respectively.

Between February 1 and March 12, 2019, a total of 15,368 containers moved through the port and were delivered to importers, of which 1,551 containers housed palm oil imported by seven importers.

And still over 2,429 containers remain at the port, half of which are carrying edible oil that has been parked out in the elements for over two months.

Health professionals advise that the product has to be stored at room temperature and should be sold within six months of the date of production. Palm oil is also known to have high concentrations of saturated fat, which can be harmful to cardiovascular health.

The product is also one of 18 food items selected by the Ethiopian Standard Agency for inspection, which requires that the product be imported prior to reaching halfway to its expiration date. Importers are also expected to provide the Agency with a production date of the product at least twice a year.