Abstract
The Ethiopian government has set itself the goal of achieving industrialization and becoming a middle-income country by 2025. The Ethiopian textile industry has been seen as a major catalyst in this regard. Generally, a rising annual growth rate of a country’s real per capita gross domestic product (GDP) is commonly seen as an indicator of improvement in the standard of living for the country’s inhabitants amongst mainstream economists, though some have increasingly argued that it is an imperfect indicator. The economic growth approach has proven somewhat successful in Ethiopia: according to the World Bank, Ethiopia’s economy has experienced GDP growth averaging 9.8 percent a year from 2008/09 to 2018/19. Yet, findings from a research project on labour turnover and absenteeism in the Ethiopian textile industry highlight how the provided jobs fail to attain improved living standards and lead to the dissatisfaction of Ethiopian low-wage workers. In this chapter, I critically reflect on the development and economic growth paradigms and explore the discrepancy between the objective of the Ethiopian government to reduce poverty by becoming industrialized and the de facto reality of manufacturing female workers in the garment industry. Drawing on 28 and 35 in-depth interviews with workers and ex-workers at Bole Lemi Industrial Park (BLIP), Addis Ababa and Hawassa Industrial Park (HIP), Hawassa respectively, this chapter offers an examination of the working and living conditions of Ethiopian female garment workers. I find that jobs in this industry do not bring the improvement for the workers that is allegedly desired. Standards of living for workers generally remain poor. Concluding, the creation of formal occupation for women with little formal education is important looking at it from the government’s perspective. However, the jobs that are created also need to ensure that workers can sustain their lives. It further becomes apparent that the assumption of industrialization, incorporation into Global Value Chains (GVCs), economic growth, and wage labour equating improved living standards, remains a myth.
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Change history
27 February 2024
A correction has been published.
Notes
- 1.
Research findings are drawn from a research project on labour turnover and absenteeism in the Ethiopian garment industry. The project is carried out under the lead of Prof Dr Reimer Gronemeyer (Institute of Sociology, University of Giessen) with a research team from the University of Giessen, Germany and Hawassa University and Wolkite University, Ethiopia. The project is funded by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). See: https://www.uni-giessen.de/fbz/fb03/institutefb03/soziologie/professuren/gronemeyer/labourturnover.
- 2.
The mentioned study analysed the developments of three parks: Eastern Industrial zone, Bole Lemi Industrial Zone and Hawassa Industrial Park.
- 3.
The interviews were carried out by the project’s PhD students Setisemhal Getachew, Hawassa University and Gifawosen Markos Mitta, Wolkite University in 2020 and 2021. The interviews were all carried out in a period in which the global COVID-19 pandemic was affecting every individual but also global value chains. Furthermore, in the same period, violent conflict broke out in Ethiopia’s Tigray region and has in the subsequent months spread more widely in the country. The findings might therefore be influenced by these two events, although we cannot say with certainty to what extent.
- 4.
SGT-Int-Workers-2020-18.
- 5.
The foreign currency translation is based on the exchange rate of October 20, 2022. Hence, when the interviews were carried out in 2020 and 2021, the wages in euro were lower.
- 6.
MGM-Int-Workers-2021-12.
- 7.
MGM-Int-Workers-2021-16.
- 8.
SGT-Int-Ex-Workers-2020-1.
- 9.
MGM-Int-Workers-2021-4.
- 10.
SGT-Int-Ex-Workers-2020-1.
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Rössner, H. (2023). Economic Development at All Costs? The Ethiopian Garment Industry and its Female Workers. In: Gronemeyer, R., Fink, M. (eds) Industrialization in Ethiopia: Awakening - Crisis - Outlooks. Sozialwissenschaftliche Zugänge zu Afrika. Springer VS, Wiesbaden. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-41794-9_6
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