مجموعة ٢/٥٤ "لجنة الشرق الأوسط (الرسمية): مجموعة العمل" [و‎‎٢‎٤] (٦٤٢/٤٧)

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CONFIDENTIAL
ETHIOPIA
Economic and Social Development
I Population .
No census of population has ever been taken in Ethiopia and.
^ s ^ c ®^. relio ^le figures, estimates have varied as much as
^5 ?? million. As far as can be judged, the rate of increase
is not high owing to the fact that the medical services are inadequate
th S + K! ^ 0 ^, the country, non-existent; and it can be
abreast of the birth rat^ mortality rates kee P ve ry nearly
The population of Ethiopia consis 1 b of a number of separate
and e LSee of^oM f rom / ao11 otkQr in language, religion, customs
and degree of social and economic development. The ruling race.
the Amhara,. have in the course of the last three or four hundred
T-onn spre ? dln g southward from the region of Gondar and Lake
to constitute t?:? P i 0Se t ? emsev l es on the Galla, who are believed
'dd?B ■g es J Sln gl® racial element in the Empire.
^ddis Ababa, founded by the Emperor Menelik II, is situated in a
purely Galla area. Related to the Amhara are the Tigreans of the
Provinces of Ethiopia and of the Eritrean highlands. The
reliffion cousin t® Amharic, and the same Coptic
religion is followed by Amhara and Tigrean alike.
4 .J n J 311 ® west an( ^ south-west there exi^t numbers of small
i V1 ^ GS, 1 most Jy P a & an * °f considerably greater importance
are the lowland inhabitants in the east. In the north-east are
,, G anakils and in the erst and south-east occupying somewhat„ more
th ? n 4 -^ he n Pro y^ nce °S a den are the Somalis. Both the Danakils
and the Somalis are Moslems. Their economy is almost exclusively
pastoral and tneir way of life tribal and nomadic. Both are
racially akin to their neighbours across the frontiers with
Eritrea, on the one hand, and British and Italian Somaliland on
the other.
In the south, i.e. in the areas on both sides of the lakes
as far as the northern frontier of Kenya, the population is
predominantly Galla.
II. ECONOMIC POSITION
1. Agriculture.
(l) General
Ethiopia, except in the dry and semi-desert areas adjoining
Eritrea and Soma!iland, enjoys a rainfall which is suitable fo/
the cultivation of a wide variety of crops. Coffee, cereals,
pulses, cotton, tobacco and many oil producing seeds are grown
successfully without the aid of modern agricultural methods. This
is due, in additon to the rainfall, to the richness of the soil
rather than.to good husbandry, for only a few farmers make use
of crop rotation or of animal as a fertilizer.