Textile and apparel companies from the US and India are planning to invest in Ethiopia. To explore investment opportunities, delegations from these countries visited Ethiopia recently. While the US delegation was busy investigating industrial zones in different parts of the country, India-based Shri Vallabh Pittie (SVP) Group has already decided on setting up a spinning mill in the industrial zone in Kombolcha, with an investment worth $550 million says the Ethiopian News Agency.
The US delegation consisted of 40 investors, among them representatives from VF Corporation and Phillips-Van Heusen (PVH), including Mark Green, PVH’s vice president. The delegation also met the Ethiopian President Mulatu Teshome in Addis Ababa last week. The reasons behind scouting for prospects are the country’s favourable investment policy, availability of vast human resources and reliable power supply apart from well-established industrial zones in different parts of the country.
President Teshome has assured that the Ethiopian Government would encourage investments in the industrial sector and also pointed to the country’s cotton cultivation on more than three million hectares of land as a benefit for textile and garment manufacturers. Last but not least, the African Growth and Opportunities Act (AGOA) allows investors easy access to the US market.
SVP group’s spinning mill would have a capacity to produce about 280 tons of cotton yarn per day and would create jobs for about 13,000 Ethiopians. The manufactured yarn would be produced mainly for the export market, especially, the US, Germany, Italy, Sweden and Turkey.
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