Employers' and patients' evaluations of the services of private versus government higher education and health institutions in Addis Ababa

As part of the study on Investment Climate and Business Environment (ICBE) in Addis Abeba, Ethiopia, this study reports on interviews with thirty randomly-selected employers of private higher education (PHE) graduates, thirty of their alumni, and thirty patients of private health institutions. Employers were asked to compare the service provision performance of private higher education graduates and private health service provision with that of government. The comparative criteria for each are listed in tables 2 and 3. In both education and health, with respect to each of the criterion, respondents were asked to choose between About the Same, Better or Worse. About 2/3 of the employers of the PHE graduates stated that the work output of PHE graduates and of government trained graduates was About the Same. 26% rated them Better, and 12% considered them Worse. 45% of the patients said that private sector provision was Better than that of government, while only 11% stated that private provision is Worse. Only 1/3 said that they are About the Same. This implies that compared to education, there is a wider perceived gap in health service provision by government and the private sector in favor of the latter. Under the sum total of health service provision, 82% responded that private provision is Better. From this finding, it can be asserted that private sector higher education and health institutions are making noticeable progress at least in the eyes of employers of graduates and patients receiving the services of private health institutions. The policy reforms appear to be bearing fruit, as expressed in the expansion figures for PHE and private health service provisions reported in the main study. However, there are several areas that require fine tuning of policy and institutional reforms. Rather than absorbing the “leftover” from the government sector, as is the case now, genuine and effective partnerships between government institutions, private institutions, and employers need to be remodeled with a certain level of autonomy for each. Government needs autonomy to ensure that its social goals are not subsumed by the profit motive of private firms. The latter requires autonomy to tailor its services in order to meet the specific demands of the market. As the ultimate beneficiaries of the process, employers, students and patients can enrich the institutional package

The Economic and Political Cost of Not Integrating Indigenous Knowledge in Agrarian Policy Making in Ethiopia

abatua laygedelwendimua laygedelarsew yabluat injihodua endaygodelSince her father cannot killnor can her brotherlet them feed herby cultivating so that herstomach will not be empty[From a popular Ethiopian melody]When the property and the knowledge of a people increases,the government's policy and wealth parameters also increase.As the knowledge and wealth of people develop, thegovernments’ instruments of policy implementation acquireadditional strength [effectiveness]".Negadras Gebrehiwot Baykedagn.Written in 1917, Translated as State & Economy inEarly 19th Century Ethiopia,Karnak House & Red Sea Press, 1995. pp 53-54This paper examines the pitfalls of an otherwise well intentioned agrarian reform which formed the centre piece of the 1974 Ethiopian Revolution. It is contended that most of the non-anticipated negative consequences emanated from the adoption of Euro-centric model not sufficiently interfaced with the specificity of rural Ethiopia. The paper focuses on the implication of the reform for rural migration, the related problem of famine, redistribution of rural incomes and the impact on the welfare of the rural and the urban poor and accumulation. Finally, it brings to the fore the gist of an indigenous knowledge source on the political economy of Ethiopia which may have provided better policy reform base for the Agrarian Reform. In the search to compress the agrarian structure of Ethiopia into the social trajectory of European societies, it has been variously conceptualized as part feudal, part capitalist or wholly feudal or capitalist by writers and different political protagonists. The term feudo-bourgeoisie was the common theme which informed the political tract of analysts and activists alike on the eve and during the course of the Ethiopian Revolution of 1974. Informed by the fuedo-bourgeoisie paradigm, exempting tenants from the payment of land rent, the Reform of 1975 abolished ‘land-lordism’, to contain ‘relation of exploitation’, it prohibited the hiring in and the hiring out of labour. Similarly, it set a maximum of 10 hectares of land per peasant which could be operated without hiring labour and attendant exploitation. While most large farms were converted into State farms, those more than 10 hectares in peasant areas were apportioned to the nearby households. The great agrarian reform of Ethiopia provided an unfettered access and security of tenure especially to those who were tenants in the pre-reform period and opened up the prospect for new institutional and technological set up to unleash a dynamic process of agricultural development. However, possible gain from such a potential were constrained by setting cultivation ceiling at 10 hectare in one season rain-fed agriculture, the curtailment of open and competitive channels of marketing, undue bias in favour of State farms and the inefficient operations of the AMC. In the face of increasing population and declining per capita output of food, these contributed towards the creation of a new crisis manifested in very low producer and very high consumer prices, vastly increased imports, dependence on food aid and drastic reduction in the welfare of the urban and the rural poor. One of the root causes of the agrarian crises was the wrong conceptualization of the agrarian problem and the attendant uncritical application of statist policies in the form of State farms, marketing corporations and compulsory delivery of grain all copied without innovative adaptations from the social experiences of other societies. The policies led to mis-allocation of resources and failed to establish prices, which, while being sufficient to motivate peasants, would have been affordable by the rural and urban poor. The stifling of the movement of labour had a devastating effect on the drought prone agriculture. In the end, the institutions of the State provided comfort to the State elite at the expense of the welfare of the disadvantaged in society. By curtailing the trend towards accumulation, it stifled the medium and long-term growth prospect of the national economy. The political cost to the Derg has been obvious. GHB's conceptualization of State and peasants, defining the parameters of the role of the State in development in general and agriculture in particular and the articulation of the relation between agriculture and industry and the policy implications therein could have gone a long way in drawing more down to earth realistic agrarian policy measures at the historical moment when Ethiopia was on the threshold of radical change. Alas! as the Amharic saying goes “bej yale worq ende medab yekoteral”: "that gold in one's own hand is undervalued as if it were copper"Key words: Agrarian reform; Ethiopian revolution; Peasantariat; Agrarian crises; Agrarian classes; Feudalism; Distress surplus; Gultegna; Neftegna; Peasantization; Retail Price Index

The State of Business Practices and the Impact of BDS on MSMEs in Lusaka and Kabwe, Zambia

The micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) sector is generally viewed as an important component in stimulating economic growth and alleviating poverty. Many national MSME development frameworks contain support mechanisms intended to unlock full potential harboured by the MSME sector. Business development support is just one such mechanism, and within which Business Development Services (BDS) provide a specific means of influencing MSME practices towards enhanced enterprise performance and greater economic impact. The paper has looked at the practices, impact of BDS and determinants of business performance in Zambia using both descriptive and econometric analyses. Current BDS interventions do not seem to be well-aligned to key choke-point areas that could unlock the potential of Zambia's MSMEs. As such, BDS is not currently significantly influencin

Performance indicators of Icbe in private higher education and health in Addis Abeba in the post 1991 period

This article is about institutional development around Investment Climate and the Business Environment [ICBE] in the establishment and growth of segments of the vital two social services ‐ private higher education [PHE] and private health, in Addis Abeba, Ethiopia in the post 1991 period. ICBE encompasses aspects of institutions as they relate specifically to the start up, growth, development and performance or otherwise of businesses and their capacity to drive the pace of economic and social progress.While the broad objective of the study has been to gauge progress in this arena and compare levels and directions of development, the specific objectives of the study was to develop parameters of performance indicators, gauge the on‐going process as perceived by the market participants, derive issues for further fine tunings of ICBE, policy and serve as a baseline for further study.To meet the objectives of shedding light on the on‐going ICBE process, apart from desk research, the Data Collection Team interviewed 424 respondents including the managers and staff of private higher education [PHE] and private health service providers, the direct beneficiaries of the social services [employers, current students, graduate alumni and patients], the indirect beneficiaries [staff and parents] and the regulatory authorities [education and health bureaus of the City Government of Addis Abeba].Partly as a result of improved ICBE, noticeable positive changes in governance, expansion in private higher education [PHE] and private health provision, efficiency gains, more effectiveness in the physical and social infrastructure are reported. Moreover, there are trends towards improved regional & gender equity, accountability in PHE and health delivery services, some levels of innovativeness and development and sustainability. Notwithstanding these, the absolute quality and standard of education and health provision leave a lot to be desired. The noticeable achievements have been attained with some challenges which need to be addressed in the forthcoming fine tuning of ICBE improvement policies and institutional engineering.Genuine and effective partnership between Government, the private sector and employers need to be remodeled with a certain level of autonomy for each. Government needs autonomy to ensure that its social goals are not entirely subsumed by the profit objectives of PHE and private health firms. The latter require autonomy to tailor their services in order to meet the specific demand of the market. The ultimate beneficiaries of the process, employers and students can enrich the institutional packaging through bringing in their up to date need in the state of the art and the content of education.Ethiopian Journal of Economics vol 20 (1) 201

Performance Indicators of Investment and Business Environment (ICBE) Improvement in Private Higher Education (PHE) and Private Health Service Provision in Addis Abeba in the Post 1991 Period

Driven by the restructuring of the world economy with massive incremental output and demand in Asia by China and India in particular, in the last seven years or so, the Ethiopian economy has been experiencing a remarkable average growth rate of 10%.

Dimeric ligands for GPCRs involved in human reproduction: synthesis and biological evaluation

Dimeric ligands for G-protein coupled receptors that are involved in human reproduction, namely the gonadotropin releasing hormone receptor, the luteinizing hormone receptor and the follicle-stimulating hormone receptor, were synthesized and biologically evaluated.The project has been financially supported by the Council for Chemical Sciences of the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (CW-NWO) and the Schering-Plough Research Institute (Oss).UBL - phd migration 201

The new technology: Agrarian reform and peasant differentiation in Ethiopian agriculture in 1966-1980, with special reference to the Arsi Region.

Critiques of the new technology in agriculture have expressed its class, technological, regional and crop bias. They call for expanded research to cover more crops suited to ecologically marginal areas, agrarian reform to distribute its benefits and the generation of mechanical technology and institutions amenable to the poor. Ethiopia experienced both the dissemination of the new technology (first in 1967 in the Arsi Region and as of 1970 in limited parts of the country as a whole) and a radical redistributive agrarian reform (since 1975) aiming at a socialist transition in agriculture. A micro level analysis of output and input in 30 farms disaggregated into the pre and post technology period on the one hand and poor/lower middle and rich peasants on the other is built upon to assess the effect of the new technology on production, factor productivity, the social differentiation of the peasantry, changes in the form and extent of the marketed surplus and prices in 1966-1975 (post technology, pre-agrarian reform) and 1975-1980 (post new technology and post agrarian reform) in the Arsi Region. This is further extended to Ethiopian agriculture as a whole including the countrywide redistributive impact of the reform, government intervention in marketing and the terms of trade. The study argues that given the non-feudal, non-capitalist agrarian class formation in rainfed single cropping 'land surplus' agrarian economy, redistributive agrarian reform, state intervention with high marketing cost and the accumulation of merchant capital not reinvested into agriculture meet neither the redistributive nor the accumulation objectives of development