A discussion forum on privatization and share market in Ethiopia opened today, organized by HST Consulting Plc.
The objective of the meeting is to provide a recommendation to the government on what kind of privatization and stock market should Ethiopia pursue.
In his opening remake, Teshome Tafese, State Minister of Finance, said such kind of discussions would help Ethiopia to get more experiences in how to involve in privatization and share market.
Strengths and weaknesses observed in the privatization practiced during the past years were discussed during the event.
Ethiopia privatized 381 state-owned enterprises in two phases during the past 27 years, generating 49 billion birr for the government.
However, due to lack of proper monitoring mechanisms, most of the privatized enterprises failed to achieve their target.
The participants recommend the government to take lesson from this failure and avoid considering privatization as the only option
They advised the government to avoid privatizing enterprises that generate good income, citing the Chinese ZTE Corporation and Huawei Technologies, as examples.
They also recommended the government to develop clear privatization roadmap and policy.
