Economic Reform Issues in Africa Lessons for Ethiopia: Keynote address at the Inter Africa group symposium to review Ethiopia's socio-economic performance 1991-1999 by Dr. K. Y. Amoako UN under secretary general and executive secretary of ECA

Abstract

Keynote Address by Dr. K. Y. Amoako at the Inter-Africa Group Symposium to Review Ethiopia’s Socio-economic Performance 1991-1999. Dr. Amoako, Africa’s experience further shows that economic and social transformation cannot take place without the industrialization so central to economic diversification and growth in export earnings. Growth and diversification of exports rank highly on Ethiopia’s economic agenda- rightly so, considering that the country has the lowest exports per capita in the world and that coffee accounts for some two thirds of exports. An important global phenomenon of the last decade, and one warranting far greater attention in Africa, is private provision of infrastructure that is in a perilous state in many African countries, including in Ethiopia. All of Africa’s fragile gains, dear friends, will be lost if we do not confront the single biggest imponderable to our common future: that of insecurity. A key finding of the ECA’s forthcoming report is that almost all the bad performers suffered from serious civil conflict and unrest.