The Ethiopian government is expecting a 9.2% economic growth for the 2019-20 fiscal year that begins this month and ends in June next year, compared to 7.7% the previous year, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed announced on July 1.

“The economy will grow by 9.2% for the coming financial year,” he said while addressing parliament. In a report published in March, rating agency Moody’s observed that growth in the country should be around 8% in the coming years thanks to huge infrastructure investments.

Moody’s said infrastructure investments were essential economy boosters in Ethiopia between 2009 and 2018 when the country’s gross domestic product rose 10% a year between the two periods.

The economy grew at 7.7 % in 2010 (2017/18) as well as at 8.6% both in 2008 (2015/16) and in 2009 (2016/17). 5 billion birr has been collected in revenue in the last 11 months, a 10% increase compared to the previous year.

More than 11 million people are currently jobless, and the figure increases by two million each year. Last year the government created jobs for about 1.4 million people, he said.

Foreign direct investment (FDI), loans and remittance increased by 20% compared to the same period last fiscal year, while the mounts deposited by all banks increasing by 22%. Loans distributed by the banks increased by 35%, he added.

Since Abiy Ahmed was appointed Prime Minister in April last year, he has succeeded in ending feud with neighboring Eritrea and easing political and social tensions.

Sudan’s ruling military council has said a proposal submitted by the African Union (AU) and Ethiopia received on June 27 is suitable for the resumption of talks with the opposition on a transition to democracy.

The generals of the ruling Transitional Military Council (TMC) and the opposition coalition have been wrangling for weeks over what form Sudan’s transitional government should take after the military deposed long-time president Omar al-Bashir on April 11.

Mediators led by the AU and Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed have since been trying to broker a return to direct talks between the two sides.

On June 27, they presented a joint proposal to both sides after the TMC rejected a previous Ethiopian proposal and called for mediation efforts to be unified.

A draft of the AU-Ethiopia proposal suggested few changes from a previous Ethiopian plan that a coalition of protesters has endorsed.

A number of points have emerged around it, but in general it is a suitable proposal for negotiations to reach a final agreement leading to the establishment of the institutions of a transitional rule,” TMC spokesman Lieutenant General Shams al-Din Kabashi said on Friday.

He said the TMC was ready to resume “immediate, serious and honest” negotiations.

The joint proposal provides for a sovereign council that would oversee the transition, made up of seven civilians and seven members of the military with one additional seat reserved for an independent member. The balance of membership of the council had been the sticking point during weeks of talks after al-Bashir’s removal.

However, the make-up of a legislative council would only be decided after the agreement was signed. In previous drafts, the Freedom and Change opposition alliance was to make up two-thirds of that council.

Al-Bashir ruled Sudan for nearly 30 years before he was unseated following a deepening economic crisis and 16 weeks of street protests.

Sudan’s stability is seen as crucial to a volatile region straddling the Middle East and Africa.