Ethiopia offers incentives to woo South Korean investors

Ethiopia has invited South Korean companies to take advantage of its fast growing economy, large population, substantial market opportunities, air transport network and a conducive investment regime with a wide array of incentives for new investments.

Ethiopia’s Foreign Affairs Minister, Dr. Tedros Adhanom, told visiting president of South Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA), Mr. Young-Mok Kim, to encourage Korean firms to turn their eyes to the East African country since it appreciates the existing bilateral development cooperation.

KOICA’s major activity in Ethiopia centres on increasing industrial capacity through vocational training, but Mr. Kim, who visited a KOICA model village in Oromia Regional State, said the agency would expand its activities in rural development.

In a statement Tuesday, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs here quoted Dr. Adhanom as saying that he appreciated the development cooperation between South Korea and Ethiopia and expressed the hope that the historic ties between the two countries would grow through increased investment and cooperation.

The minister noted that his visit to South Korea this year enabled him to appreciate the growing interest of big companies such as SamSung to invest in Ethiopia.

He said that Ethiopia offered huge opportunities to South Korean investors interested in floriculture, a discipline of horticulture concerned with the cultivation of flowering and ornamental plants for gardens.