Ethiopia pushes plan to become Africa’s manufacturing hub
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By Tesfa-Alem Tekle
June 20, 2017 (HAWASSA) – Ethiopia on Tuesday inaugurated what it said
is the first specialized, sustainable textile and apparel industrial
park in Africa.
PNG - 227 kb
Ethiopian prime minister Hailemariam Desalegn (Allafrica)
The massive Chinese-constructed Hawassa industrial park (HIP) was
inaugurated in the presence of Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn who
officially declared the full operationalization of the park under
phase one.
At the occasion Hailemariam said Ethiopia’s vision is to be the
leading manufacturing hub in Africa by the year 2025.
“Our goal is to create millions of new jobs in labor-intensive and
export-oriented light manufacturing”, he said.
He added “the full operation of the Hawassa industrial park is the
most evident and concrete example yet towards achieving our national
vision and marks a milestone in our quest to industrialization”.
The Hawassa world-class eco-industrial park featuring state-of-the
art, environmentally-friendly technology was built by Chinese Civil
Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC) at a cost of about $ 322
million.
Covering an area of 1.3 million square meters, of which 300, 000 meter
square is factory shed build up area, the park has so far attracted 18
leading textile and garment companies from across the world including
from America, China and India.
Also, eight domestic investors have been meticulously selected and
necessary preparations are finalized to facilitate their investment
inside the park.
The park, built in record time nine months implements a Zero Liquid
Discharge (ZLD) that enables to recycle 90 %of sewerage disposal water
and fulfills international standards.
The plant uses the latest technology and has capacity to treating and
recycling 11 million liters of effluent every day.
Ethiopia says its rapid economic growth can only be sustained through
realization of a structural economic transformation.
The country has been registering a strong and steady economic growth
for more than a decade now, with an average GDP growth rate of 11%.
The most recent report from both the World Bank (Global Economic
Prospect, 2017) and IMF (World economic outlook 2017) forecast that
the horn of Africa’s nation will be one of the fastest growing
economies in the world and a star performer in the African continent
in 2017.
Furthermore Ethiopia has become one of the largest recipients of
foreign direct investment (FDI) in the continent.
According to UNCTAD’s 2017 investment report, Ethiopia is now the
second largest recipient of FDI in textile and apparel next to Vitnam.
The Ethiopian Industrial Parks Development Corporation (IPDC) Board
Chairperson Dr. Arkebe Oqubay told journalists that development of
world-class, specialized, sustainable, vertically integrated, export
-driven and competitive industrial parks is the central drive toward
realizing vision 2025.
Dr. Arkebe, who is also Special Advisor to the Prime Minister, said
currently there are some 10,000 employees in the Hawassa Park but at
full capacity the park will hire around 60,000 employees.
He added some companies in the park have already started to export and
when the park starts production at full capacity, Ethiopia will earn
around one billion USD every year from Hawassa Park alone.
Arkebe said the park could be considered as a model for other parks
being built in other East African countries.
Including those two parks which recently operationalized, Ethiopia is
currently building a total of 15 industrial parks across the country
as part of its goal to emerge as continent’s manufacturing hub.
Sudan Tribune has reliably learned that four more industrial parks
namely Mekelle, kombelcha, Adama and Dire Dawa parks will be
inaugurated till September.
(ST)
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