ADDIS ABABA – Ethiopia has secured over one billion USD exporting various items during the past four months, Ministry of Trade and Regional Integration (MoTRI) announced.
MoTRI Communication CEO Belaynesh Regassa told The Ethiopian Press Agency (EPA) that the nation has earned more than one billion USD exporting cereals, oilseeds, chat, livestock, forestry and forest products over the past four months.
Among the exported items, pulses and oilseeds contributed greatly to the performance and efforts are being made to achieve the results in other sectors, he stated.
Accordingly, MoTRI is working on supervising chat exporters to act up on market regulations to save revenue that the country loses.
MoTRI has established a new system to solve problems facing chat product and to make sure sustainability of farmers’ benefits, she noted.
In line to this, she further stated that an online service is being implemented in the marketing system.
MoTRI has made the execution of foreign contract registration and the granting of export shipping license time-saving and easy.
The ministry is supervising and supporting exporters to respect the agreement and to provide their products to the international market. Strong inspection was carried out to fight against illicit trade, Belaynesh indicated.
“Among others, the expansion of contraband, inadequate provision of oilseeds for the foreign market, imposing unnecessary tax on export products and proliferation of toll booths are serious factors which are hindering to increase the revenue yet,” she noted.
The CEO added that the ministry is undertaking a reform to solve problems in the trade sector and improve revenue thereby facilitating the service. Besides, encouraging the controlling activities on contraband, appreciating legal ability, expanding trade destinations, and increasing the existing market are the future priority areas of the ministry.
Likewise, modernizing online foreign market, improving the export licensing system, promising the international, regional, and bilateral trade ties are the other future areas of the ministry in the forthcoming period, she said.
BY MESERET BEHAILU
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD SATURDAY 2 DECEMBER 2023
