Three Sectoral Policies in Ethiopia’s Structural Transformation

Ethiopia’s stellar growth performance, guided by amicable development planning, has created a common and shared agenda for economic transformation that has fostered better social outcomes in poverty, universal education, child health, and combating AIDS. This chapter attempts to explore the interest and fascination surrounding the Ethiopian development path, beginning with a consideration of the policy innovations that underpin the experience. It identifies the similarities that connect lessons from three disparate sectoral perspectives—industrialization, social protection/food security, and the success story of Ethiopian Airlines—underlining the pivotal role of coherence, ambition, and innovation in Ethiopia’s development trajectory. Central to these characteristics is the notion that structural transformation is an aggregate of socio-economic sector successes and its potential replicability by other African countries.