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A Malaysian Business Delegation visited Ethiopia for the first time. The visit was part of a ten day business trip including three African nations.

The delegation made up of representatives from seven Malaysian companies includes delegates from various sectors including household items, detergents, electronics and automotive batteries according to  Aureen Jean Nonis, Director of Lifestyle Section-Africa  with Malaysia External Trade Development Corporation.

The rubber and palm oil sectors were not represented by this trip because Malaysian companies are already engaged in Ethiopia which is a larger importer of palm oil from Malaysia.

Ethiopia’s export earning are up by 16.6% in the last eight months as compared to the same period in the previous fiscal year noted data released by the Ministry of Trade.

Revenue from export was 1.87 billion US dollars while earnings for the same period last year was 1.6 billion US dollars.

The increase in revenue was due to higher earnings from oil seeds and gold although the revenue from the number one national export coffee has shown a decline showed the report.

Ethiopia is to increase its import of palm oil and sugar in the next budget year. The government plans to increase the import of palm oil by 56% and sugar by 11% according to the Ministry of Trade.

The decision to increase imports was reached with two thirds of the previous imports still in stock at various warehouses operated by the Merchandise Wholesale and Import Trade Enterprise.  

A change in the size of containers from larger 20 liter jerry cans to smaller 5 and 10 liter ones in the next round of imports is expected to solve issues with distributing oil seen said sources.

The export of coffee from Ethiopia has declined by 38% in the first eight months of the financial year, as compared to the same period  last, according to data from players in the sector.

The Ethiopia Commodity Exchange has consequently eliminated the 5% +/- price range for coffee intended to regulate against price fluctuations on the international market last week.

The range will not be applicable on the trading floor of  Exchange until the price of coffee stabilizes on the international market said Dr. Eleni Z. Gebremedhin, Chief Executive of the ECX.