Ethiopia has been hosting the 12th African Growth & Opportunity Act (AGOA) and designing the AGOA response strategy, in order to increase its benefits. The lines of projects are believed to help the country reap even more benefit from the Power Africa Initiative – a new five year project launched by President Obama. The initiative, which was catalysed during the US premier’s official visit to Tanzania last June, targets working with six countries – Tanzania, Ethiopia, Kenya, Ghana, Nigeria and Liberia. The first three countries privileged from 80pc of the total investment share. The private sector in the US has shown great interest, given that the initiative safeguards the private companies, Andrew M. Herscowitz, right, coordinator for Power Africa & Trade Africa, told journalists during a press conference held on Sunday August 11, 2013, in the premises of the African Union (AU). The lines of projects include geothermal energy, energy distribution and transmission manufacture plant, which are said to be three key areas to making successful investments through the initiative. The African Development Bank (AfDB) will also allocate as much as three billion dollars, which will leverage at least four times more investments in the energy sector, over the next five years. “The AfDB will present the initiative with a list of power transactions across the six main focus countries,” said Gabriel Nigatu, middle, regional director for East Africa Resource Centre. Paul Marin, far left, representative of the US Trade & Development Association, Don De Amicis, left, representative of Overseas Private Investment Corporation and Peter Gathercole, president of Symbion Power Tanzania attended the meeting.