Woreta, Dire Dawa, Moyale and Mekelle will see new dry ports installed in their territory this year. Construction will soon begin as feasibility studies have already been completed.

Ashebir Nota public relations head at the Ethiopian Dry Port Services Enterprise says they expect the new ports to make trade smoother and relations better with neighboring countries. Woreta Dry port, 620 Km northwest of Addis Ababa will serve the Sudan region and Port Sudan 1,881 kilometers to the north. Sesame is Ethiopia’s largest export item to north and south Sudan.

A port in Moyle, 771 kilometers south of Addis Ababa will serve Kenya. The region’s large livestock population means more potential for exporting meat and dairy products.

Mekelle dry port, 783 km north of Addis Ababa will make it easier for the construction industry to obtain materials and facilitate export sesame from Southern Tigray to Djibouti port.

Dire Dawa’s large population of people in the import and export business is the reason for the new Dire Dawa dry port which will be used to get goods to Djibouti port and Berbera port, Somaliland which are 964 and 910 Km east of Addis Ababa.

The Ethiopian Dry Port Services Enterprise reports that over half of the work on Modjo and Semera dry ports is completed and wants to improve its implementation capacity, service delivery, customer service and transparency. It is currently in the process of short listing proposals from Italy, China and Netherlands to give training to its staff.

In the past four months, the Enterprise has earned 25.4 million birr from 4,732 stuffed containers and 2,641 unstuffed containers. This is 87 percent of its target goals.

The Ethiopian government is in the process of merging the Dry ports service Enterprise with the Ethiopian Maritime Transit Services (EMTS) and the Ethiopian Shipping Lines (ESL) although the respective roles of these organizations are yet to be determined.

Dry Ports Services Enterprise is a public enterprise established in 2007 by the council of ministers regulation No. 136/2007 with the aim of developing and operating the dry ports in the country and is now serving as a point of destination and departure for Ethiopia’s import and export cargoes.

CapitalEthiopia