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The amount of remittance transfer to Ethiopia from the Diaspora in the past five months is said to be about $1.6 billion.
It is the Ethiopian Diaspora Agency that disclosed about it in a statement sent to state media, Ethiopian News Agency.
The plan for the budget years is to collect $4 billion in remittance.
Ethiopia has collected about nine billion dollars in the past three years from the same revenue stream.
Apart from the remittance, Ethiopians in the diaspora have donated about 400 million Ethiopian birr to support those impacted by the war in the Afar and Amhara regions. Part of it was raised via the new online donation site and part of it was channelled via Ethiopian diplomatic missions abroad.
About 23,000 Ethiopians in the diaspora chipped in to raise $US 5 million dollar, according to the agency.
Furthermore, the Ethiopian Diaspora is said to have contributed about 103 million birr support ( in cash and in kind) to the Ethiopian Defence Force.
After Ethiopian PM Abiy initiated Great Ethiopian homecoming challenge, tens of thousands of Ethiopians in the diaspora have already arrived in the country. Up to a million are expected.
The statement sent to ENA also talked about Diaspora participation in investment and business. In the past five months, members of the diaspora community with a 22.4 billion birr registered capital have expressed interest.
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You do realize that in the last five months the economy collapsed. One in four people in Addis lost their job since Covid19. Now businesses are just bankrupting due to no sales. PM Abiy has shut down all Tigray businesses, so even ones that creaked jobs are now closed. Distrust is everywhere. With so few tourists, there is also less security needed and there is a lack of security forcing people to be worrisome in public.
Those getting help from the diaspora are very lucky. Less can be said of those that do not have such international friends. Of course, power outages and network problems could mean sending remittance was something of the past. Cyber attacks and sanctions will make such transactions troublesome and illegal.