So Much Construction

One of the most stun­ning things about the cap­i­tal of Ethiopia is the omnipres­ence of huge con­struc­tion projects.  In 2006, Addis Ababa ranked as the world’s 31st fastest grow­ing city in the world.  The coun­try con­sumes some 3 mil­lion tons of cement per year.  Accord­ing to The Econ­o­mist, Ethiopia’s econ­omy will be the 5th fastest grow­ing econ­omy in 2010.

A lot of work is going into imag­in­ing Addis Ababa’s future.  This dis­play by Sun­shine Con­struc­tion in the lobby of the Hilton Hotel is one exam­ple.  I was sur­prised to find the trade mag­a­zine Con­struc­tion Ahead for sale among the lim­ited selec­tion of mag­a­zine at the Lime Tree Cafe’s Book World shop, a pop­u­lar ex-pat hang out.

The city is going through an intense period of urban­iza­tion.  China is invest­ing in the con­struc­tion of roads.  I’ve noticed com­men­tary about Addis being rel­a­tively free of beg­gars in the past, a con­di­tion which is cer­tainly not the case now, as I’ve noted ear­lier.  How will all these changes impact the major­ity of res­i­dents in the cap­i­tal?  Wikipedia’s entry on Ethiopia cites that 55% of Addis’s res­i­dents live in slums and only 12% of homes have tile or con­crete floor­ing.  If the word on the street is true, that all the units in the huge hous­ing com­plexes under con­struc­tion have already been pur­chased by Ethiopi­ans liv­ing abroad, this con­struc­tion boom in unlikely to relieve the hous­ing short­age.  Some arti­cles in the cur­rent issue of Con­struc­tion Ahead stress the need to focus on long term devel­op­ment in place of short term profit.  Every­one seems poised to see how these famil­iar trends in urban­iza­tion will con­tinue to play out for Addis Ababa.