Why big farms flopped in Ethiopia
Too few investors knew the land; too many deals were crooked
THE PLAN was to transform farming in southern Ethiopia. Twelve years ago Fri-El, an Italian conglomerate, signed a lease with the state government for 30,000 hectares of farmland in South Omo to make palm oil. But the palms needed more water than the copper-coloured Omo river could supply and production was so disappointing that in 2011 its lease was cut by a third in size. Even a switch to cotton production did not help. Many bolls are left unpicked owing to labour shortages. A ginnery lies idle for want of electricity.
This article appeared in the Middle East & Africa section of the print edition under the headline “Dummy farms”
From the April 11th 2020 edition
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