Content: Editorial

There is little doubt within the local and international policy circles about the great strides Ethiopia has taken in making basic healthcare services accessible to the millions of citizens living in hard to reach areas. The nation’s efforts have often been used as a success story in international forums. National health policy gurus, including the […]

When looking deeply at the policy circle, one would understand that anxiety predominates over any other feeling. The converging temporal winds of the Growth & Transformation Plan (GTP), a rather ambitious book of developmental promises, the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and the upcoming national election are testing the strength of the government under the ruling […]

There seems to be nothing officials of the Ethiopian government are more proud about than their achievement in the economic sphere. They often mention it as a historic achievement for a nation that has long been besieged by conflict and poverty. Their affection for the gross domestic product (GDP) expansion over the past 12 years […]

Science is not an alien thing for the Revolutionary Democrats. Rather, it is heavily related to them, as most were undergraduate students at various universities before revolting against the extractive feudalist regime of Haile Selassie and the subsequent military dictatorship, the Dergue. Had it not been for the political waters of the time, most were […]

There seems to have been no other time in Ethiopia’s policymaking history that coverage has been as comprehensive as it is with the incumbent government. Under the Revolutionary Democrats, the policy circle has been bestowed with numerous policy documents covering all areas. The latest addition to the expanding list of policy documents is the Aviation […]

It seems that the United States, the global economic and political superpower that had been stirring the global decision wheel alone for over two decades, before the recent rise of the rest, including China, India, Brazil and Russia, wants to get engaged with Africa in a new way. Left with one year to end his […]

Populism is not the typical trait of the ruling Revolutionary Democrats. More often than not, they seem to enjoy the journey against the tides of public opinion. And this has been the case for their two decades of governing the rather volatile nation. In the early 1990s, their differing stance on issues of land tenure, […]

The modern bureaucratic apparatus of the nation takes its root to Haileselassie’s Regime. Most of the institutions of the current state saw their formative years under the feudalistic regime, which, by and large, could be categorised as extractive. Enhanced exposure to foreign countries seems to have helped the process. Exchange programs have given the elite […]

Focusing on agriculture is not only a political matter for the ruling Revolutionary Democrats. It also is an issue of numerical understanding. A little over 80pc of the nation’s population relies on Agriculture. The sector is also a major contributor to the national gross domestic product (GDP), with its share standing at 45pc in 2013, […]

For all his critics defining him as caretaker of his predecessor’s lines, last week’s meeting of Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn with businesspeople was nothing but evidence against their presumptions. Hailemariam stood tall, firm and articulate in explaining the policy lines of his administration, which, for obvious reasons, takes much of its policy arguments from the […]

Economic policymaking is easier said than done. Be it in developed countries, which leverage advanced markets and regulatory instruments, or in developing ones, where market infrastructure and trading cultures remain underdeveloped, crafting economic policies entails a difficult task of balancing the interests of various entities. These include individual, communal, corporate and sectoral interests. If one […]

Thanks to the policy genius of their late leader, Meles Zenawi, the ruling EPRDFites are now sufficiently endowed with their own unique combination of policy arguments. Be it in traditional policy aspects, such as foreign policy and resource administration, or in modern dimensions, such as cyber security and financial intelligence, they seem to have invested […]

Here comes question time for the ruling Revolutionary Democrats. As the month of July fast approaches, the issue of money will take centre stage in the policy circle, for it is budget time. What has been spent well over the past year will be evaluated and the allocation of next year’s finance defined. With this, […]

Aggressive infrastructure development is one of the typical features of the new narrative about Ethiopia in the development circles. The name of the nation that has for long been associated with famine and conflict has given way to the new association with extensive development of basic access points to mobility, markets and well being. It […]

Sufian Ahmed, the long serving finance minister, has so much to be proud of during his 14 years of service as the point man of the Ethiopian economy. Under his leadership, the economy has witnessed double digit economic growth. Even by the accounts of the international financial institutions (IFIs), including the World Bank and the […]

There is a special relationship, to say the least,  between the ruling Revolutionary Democrats and the farming experience. Cognisant of the strong support ever since their first days of guerrilla fighting with the Derg regime, the relationship continues to have a special place in the hearts and minds of the ruling elite. After assuming power […]

It seems that there is a disconnect between the global policy sphere and that of the local one. Much of the debate in the global policy sphere relates to possible ways of improving government transparency; reducing the disruptive role of the state in the market through policy actions, such as tapering monetary expansion; and collaborating […]

If there is one thing that the ruling Revolutionary Democrats would not feel easy about, it is international credibility. It has been their typical character, regardless of the sphere they take a policy action in. Over the years, therefore, this sense of them has grown too big in both dimension as well as magnitude. In […]

Privatisation was one of the many projects that the ruling Revolutionary Democrats adopted immediately after coming into power. At that time, they were experiencing ideological oscillation between their long overdue inclination towards socialism and the rising dominance of free market liberalism. As newcomers to the throne, they needed to align their interests with that of […]

Defying populism and living up to their belief is a trend well in the blood of the ruling Revolutionary Democrats ever since they came to power. They have resisted popular policy winds so much so that they often are portrayed as rigid. Yet, it has all little to do with rigidity. Under the prism of […]

The appearance of Prime Minster Hailemariam Desalegn in front of the federal legislative, which witnesses 99.8pc domination by members of the ruling EPRDF, was meant to disclose the nine months performance of his government. In what could be said as a lacklustre session, the 547-member legislature saw a rather forceful Prime Minister with the heartiness […]

The pre-1991 Ethiopia was largely known as a country that lacks the basic economic and social infrastructures to push the economy forward. Whatever it had was constructed for the militaristic interest of the pseudo-socialist military dictatorship. There was little in the form of public investment on infrastructure tailored to facilitate economic growth. As a result, […]

There is nothing as preoccupying as the issue surrounding the Great Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) for the administration of Prime MinisterHailemariam Desalegn. It is the one project that all eyes are staring at with historic interest and unflinching curiosity. There is a universal consensus within the varying sections of the Ethiopian community that the project […]

For the administration of Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn, which takes many of its policy tricks from the compendium of policy books authored by the late Meles Zenawi, macroeconomy has been the beneficiary of little or no innovation. Referring back to the basic books of Melesnomics has been the common trend for the macroeconomic policymakers. As […]