Preparations are underway to integrate opal and other mineral products into the trading platform of the Ethiopian Commodity Exchange (ECX), expanding its activities beyond agricultural commodities.
The Ethiopian Commodity Exchange was only able to attract a single bidder for the seat it offered for bid. The seat was put 
on sale through the exchange after Ural Industries to relinquish its seat on the ECX.
The only interested bidder for the sea was Dejen Industrial plc which made an offer of 1.3 million birr for the seat on the exchange.
It is to be remembered that the trade volume of the exchange reached 21 billion birr in the last financial year while its trading volume increased to 601,000 tons announced the ECX.
The Ethiopian Commodity Exchange (ECX) announced it will further strengthen the warehouse receipt financing scheme during the opening of the Warehouse Receipt System for Inclusive Agricultural Finance Symposium.
The scheme makes farmers eligible for bank loan using their Warehouse Receipt issued by the Exchange for commodities stored in ECX warehouses as collateral.
ECX Chief Executive Officer, Eleni Gebre-Medhin, told participants at the Warehouse Receipt Systems for Inclusive Agricultural Finance Symposium, organized jointly by ECX and the International Finance Corporation (IFC), amount exceeding 1.5 million USD warehouse receipt financing service was made available to framers last year. The scheme has considerably assisted smallholder farmers who would have no choice but to sell produce at low prices.
The Ethiopia Commodities Exchange (ECX) is reduced the expiration date of warehouse receipts issued for coffee from 30 days to 20 days as of May 9, 2013.
The ECX governing body, Ethiopian Commodity Exchange Authority (ECEA) has approved the change with others relating to moisture adjustment, the amount that should be contained in a bag, and the cost of handling goods.
ECX introduced these changes following a series of studies it undertake during the current year based on transaction data from the past 18 days, according to Anteneh Assefa, CEO of the Exchange. The study revealed that 50pc of members storing coffee at ECX warehouses make a sale within eight days and 90 percent of members within 20 days.
The Ethiopian Commodity Exchange (ECX) is to sell full membership seats for farmers cooperatives. Earlier this year, the exchange has announced that it will provide 30 full membership seats for farmer cooperatives to facilitate their direct involvement in the exchange.
