Ethiopia GEQIP

Excerpt from a World Bank (Ethiopia: General Education Quality Improvement
Program (GEQIP) report of November 7, 2008:

Ethiopia is the second most populous country in Africa (estimated around 80 million, of which approximately 12 million are pastoralists and 80 percent of the population live in rural areas), and has a decentralized government structure. Having invested heavily in physical infrastructure and human resources over the past decade, the economy has achieved impressive growth (averaging 11.8 percent annually in the period of 2004-07). Despite recent growth and an abundance of natural resources, it is one of the poorest countries in the world with per capita income of less than US$180 in 2007 and 39 percent of the population estimated to live below the poverty line in 2004/05.1 Ethiopia is ranked 169 out of 177 countries on the United Nations Development Program’s Human Development Index. Under the highly centralized Derg regime (1975 to 1991), Ethiopia’s regional and woreda governments were marginalized. After the fall of the Derg, GOE adopted decentralization as the cornerstone for building a multi-ethnic democratic country. Combined with a commitment to fiscal decentralization, this signifies the Government’s intention to give local governments more direct and transparent control over public spending.

Posted, unedited, by Elspeth who is in graduate school and has read way too many articles like this lately.