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Businesses located in the lobby of the Hilton Hotel, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia are to stop services as of the 31st of December.

The Hilton administration made the decision to temporarily close business activities in the hotel lobby because of complaints from customers said Vijay Shanker, Director of Business Development for the hotel.

Ethio-German Konnect (EGK), a forum and networking event, was opened on Wednesday. The business forum is expected to create business opportunities for Ethiopian and German entrepreneurs.

The three day event will present various elements of Ethio-German business relations including private sector development partnership, investments and joint ventures.

EGK is organized by the Returning Experts Program of the Center for International Migration and Development.

Ethiopian woman entrepreneur, Samrawit Moges, was honored, as one of a 100 women from across the globe, with inspirational achievements. The award, organized by The International Alliance for Women, was held in Washington DC on the 27th of October.

“We have been inspired and humbled by the stories of people like you who, often without fanfare, have taken action to support women’s economic empowerment and advancement in society and business” read the letter of award to Samrawit.

Samrawit is the first Ethiopian to be honored in the entrepreneurial category. She was nominated by Nigist Haile founder and Executive Director of the Center for African Women Economic Empowerment and honorary member of TIAW.

The Development Bank of Ethiopia has earned 71.4 million birr in the first quarter of the fiscal year. The profit earned by the bank is 52% more than what it earned in the same period last year but 2 million birr less than its target.

The Development Bank also exceeded its target for loan approvals by approximately 1 billion birr in the last quarter. Loan approvals were especially concentrated in the agriculture and manufacturing sectors.

The Ethiopian Revenues and Customs Authority (ERCA) announced that it has raised 1.6 billion birr in tax from Addis Ababa, in the first quarter of the current fiscal year. The money collected is double that of the same period last year.

Revenue raised from municipal services increased the revenue from the capital city to 1.75 billion birr, making up 30% of the sum the tax authority plans to raise this fiscal year.

The Ethiopia tax authority raised an additional 16 billion from tax and non tax revenues on the federal level in the past quarter.

The Ethiopian Horticulture Development Agency announced that Ethiopia has earned 55 million US dollars in horticultural exports in the first quarter of this fiscal year.  

The revenue was raised from the export of fruits and vegetables as well as flowers and other produce explained the press statement from the agency.

Awash Insurance has announced 18 million birr in revenue in the first quarter of the current fiscal year. The Ethiopian insurers paid out 69 million birr in claims which is 19 million birr more than the same period last year.

Awash Insurance was able to sale 203 million birr worth of insurance policies over the last year exhibiting a 46% increase from the previous year according to Kenea Daba, head of the Awash board.

Castel Winery is expected to bottle wine for export form its vineyard in Zeway early next year. The French company is the first foreign winery in Ethiopia after the socialist regime.

The French wine maker has installed 28, 430 hectolitre, Inox tankers for the production of its first bottles of wine according to Robel Seido, Sales and Marketing Manager at Castel.

The wines will be bottled over the next 3-6 months and will be available to the market shortly thereafter said Seido. The first wines to reach the market are expected to be white wine he added.

A Moroccan Company, S2M, has won the bid to form a joint electronic payment system for three Ethiopian banks. Awash International Bank, NIB International Bank and United Bank formed Premier Switch Solutions SC which will use S2M to integrate their ATM services.

Fourteen international firms took part in the bid according to Berhanu Getaneh President of United Bank.
S2M is expected to form a system that will enable ATM holders at the three banks to withdraw money at all ATM machines operated by members of the Premier Switch.

Ethiopian Airlines will become an official member of Star Alliance in a ceremony to be held next month. It is expected that CEOs of the 27 members of Star Airlines and other aviation dignitaries will attend the ceremony.

Ethiopian Airlines is trying to select a day that will enable all CEO’s to attend the ceremony according to Wegayehu Terefe Public Relations Manager of Ethiopian Airlines.

The Airlines aims to mark the event with a lavish ceremony as it is a significant milestone in its efforts to become a world class airline said Wegayehu.