The Ethiopian government has relocated about 150,000 people in the eastern Somali region to more fertile areas in the past five months, the Minister for Federal Affairs said.
Scattered households have been brought together into villages to raise their “quality of life,” Shiferaw Teklemariam said in an interview today in the capital, Addis Ababa.
In the next seven months, another 70,000 households, or 350,000 people, will move into “communes” in the arid region, Shiferaw said. Similar programs are taking place in other states. About 45,000 households will be moved in Gambella, almost three-quarters of the population; 45,000 in Benishangul Gumuz; and 50,000 to 80,000 in the Afar region.
“It’s a very ambitious program,” Shiferaw said. “We don’t want anyone to be left behind” as the government targets economic growth of between 11 percent and 14.9 percent, he said. More on Bloomberg
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