A new Manufacturing Industry Policy had been tabled for approval by the Council of Ministers on December 20, 2023. As part of Ethiopia’s on-going Home-Grown Economic Reform Agenda, authorities sought the manufacturing sector to have a major role in the national economy.

Although the number of manufacturing firms, employment opportunity, outputs, value additions and exports in Ethiopia’s manufacturing sector has been growing, the sector has not grown as per country’s growth potential and its share in the country’s GDP remained well below the African average. The sector did not display the desired level of productivity and competitiveness, and has not been adequately helping in replacing replace imported intermediate inputs and goods thereby contributing towards trade imbalance & foreign exchange scarcity.

A draft Manufacturing Industry Policy which aims at solving these and other problems of the sector by improving manufacturing production capabilities of the country was, therefore, discussed and approved by Ethiopian Council of Ministers on December 20, 2023, Ethiopian Monitor reported.