Hawassa Industrial Park: A Journey towards Industrialization
The Hawassa Industrial Park is expected to employ 60,000 people at full capacity and be able to generate export revenue amounting to 1 billion U.S. dollars
Recently, Ethiopia inaugurated the largest industrial park in Africa. The Hawassa Industrial Park, which was built on 300 hectares of land, has been dedicated to host mainly textile and garment products.
Currently, fifteen leading global apparel and textile companies from America, China, India, Sri Lanka as well as six local manufacturers are operating within the park. It also has thirty-seven factory sheds, and its own renewable electricity source.
Furthermore, Hawassa Industrial Park also consists a provision of all government services one-stop shop service center and also employs Zero Liquid Discharge (ZLD) that enables to recycle 85 percent of sewerage disposal water and fulfills international standards.
Indeed, the Park have additional area allocated for shared facilities, as it encompasses an area of 1.3 million square meters, of which 300,000 meter square is factory shed build up area.
The park will serve as a prototype for the industrial parks being built in other parts of the country.
Prime Minister Haielmariam Desalegn said, “The eco-friendly industrial park will showcase that environmental protection and development can go hand in hand. The manufacturing sector's share in Ethiopia's Growth Domestic Product (GDP) for many years stood at only 5 percent, showing the need for economic structural challenge if the country is to meet its economic promise."
Special advisor to the Prime Minister Arkebe Equbay said the park can attract Chinese firms that are moving overseas to open plants. Ethiopia with a young labor force of 45 million people has a huge potential in the manufacturing sector. "As annual manufacturing growth currently is 25 percent, in 10 years' time, it's projected to increase its GDP share by four fold and it's share in exports to 50 percent," he added.
The Hawassa Industrial Park is expected to employ 60,000 people at full capacity and be able to generate export revenue amounting to 1 billion U.S. dollars.
Indeed, the Park is the beginning of many to come.
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