SUMMARY • Ethiopia’s Afar region, especially around Lake Afdera, is the country’s main source of salt, accounting for 80 per cent of the national market. The salt sector in the region has been dominated by non-Afar investors from neighbouring…
RVI publishes books, research reports, research papers, briefings and meeting reports in a range of formats. Publications cover policy, research, arts, culture and local knowledge in the countries of eastern and central Africa. Research publications—books, reports and papers—are peer-reviewed. Some RVI publications are also available in French and/or Arabic.
The RVI is a signatory of the Budapest Open Access Initiative (2001); all publications are free for download in PDF format under Creative Commons licences. The views expressed in books and reports published by the RVI are those of the authors, not the Institute.
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SUMMARY • Ethiopia’s Somali Regional State (SRS) is rich in natural resources, including oil and natural gas reserves in the Ogaden Basin which covers an area of approximately 350,000 sq km comprising much of the SRS. If managed properly…
SUMMARY Somalia grapples with unique cultural, societal, and structural hurdles that hinder women’s access to political processes. Despite introducing a non-legally binding quota, the most recent federal elections in 2022 saw a decline in women’s parliamentary representation. Beyond this,…
Summary In recent history, political processes in Somalia have been dominated by a narrow set of political and business elites, armed actors and external players. Following the collapse of the government in 1991, there were a series of conferences…
ማጠቃለያ Find the English version of this report here….
SUMMARY • In June 2018 and July 2019 violent clashes erupted in Hawassa, an important commercial hub in southern Ethiopian and the capital of the Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples’ Region. While the first attack appeared relatively spontaneous, the…
ማጠቃለያ Find the English version of this publication here. …
ማጠቃለያ • ድሬ ዳዋ የኢትዮጵያ ሁለተኛ ትልቅ ከተማ ስትሆን በሀገሪቱ ምስራቃዊ ክፍል – በኦሮሚያ እና በሶማሊያ ክልል አዋሳኝ ድንበር ላይ የምትገኝ የብዝሃ-ብሔር እና የኃይማኖቶች የኢኮኖሚ ማዕከል ነች። ምንም እንኳን የከተማዋ ታሪካዊ ሥርዓት በኃይማኖቶች እና በብሔሮች መካከል ባለ ወዳጅነትና መተሳሰብ…
SUMMARY • Dire Dawa, Ethiopia’s second largest city, is a multi-ethnic and multi-religious economic hub in the country’s eastern region, sitting on the contested boundary between the Oromia and Somali regions. Despite an overarching sense that the city’s historical…
SUMMARY • Gondar city is known for centuries of peaceful coexistence between its Muslim and Orthodox Christian community members. These inter-religious relations have, however, deteriorated over recent decades, erupting into view in the April 2022 attack on Muslim mourners…
Recent Publications
The Revivalist-Restorationist Motives of the Great Tradition: Mnemonic intent and actor dynamics in Ethiopia
November 13, 2026
Tracing the genealogy and current state of revivalism and restorationism of the Great Tradition (GT) within the memory landscape in Ethiopia reveals dynamic mnemonic strategies and vocabularies that evolve across successive historical regimes and various state and non-state mnemonic agents.
Writing Ethiopia into the World, Writing the World from Ethiopia
October 7, 2026
The Ethiopian Women Researchers Network (EWNET) hosted an online scholarly webinar on Friday, 30 January 2026, titled ‘Writing Ethiopia into the World and Writing the World from Ethiopia’. The webinar examined how Ethiopia has been represented within global knowledge production
The Political Economy of Coffee in the Kaffa–Bench-Sheko–Sheka Belt, Southwest Ethiopia Region
October 6, 2026
This study provides a critical political economy analysis of the coffee sector in the Kaffa–Bench-Sheko–Sheka belt in Southwest Ethiopia Peoples’ Regional State, the genetic and cultural heartland of Arabica coffee (Coffea arabica). Based on 47 key respondent interviews, the study