Gov. Authority | Ministry of Transport and Communication (MTC) |
Regulator | NA |
Designated Operator | Ethio Postal |
Monopoly/reserved services | To be completed |
National Addressing | Addressing covers both geographical and human database but not yet S42 compliant |
Participation UPU Prog. | To be completed |
E-Commerce Context:
Ethiopian e-commerce is in its early stages but has a great potential with the second largest population in Africa and a fast-growing coverage of Mobile and Internet connectivity. The country stands in front of a potential hyper growth of its ecommerce sector. This is also encouraged by recent government efforts to digitize the country, with a complete overhaul of the laws regulating commerce and digital trade being planned.
Local E-Commerce Champions (Alexa Ranking)
Name | Rank | Technology | Target | Export | Business Type | E-Payment |
2merkato | 37,381 | Joomla | B2B | No | Directory | No |
Qefira | 39,517 | Custom (Ruby) | B2C | No | Classifieds | No |
Mekina | 86,823 | WordPress | B2C | No | Classifieds | No |
DeliverAddis | 225,563 | Custom (ASP) | B2C | No | Marketplace | Yes |
Ebegeya | 229,309 | Shopify | B2C | No | Marketplace | Yes |
Ebirr.com | 242,715 | WordPress | B2C | No | PSP | Yes |
Engocha.com | 270,215 | WordPress | B2B | No | Classifieds | No |
Sherger | 699,919 | WordPress | B2C | No | Classifieds | No |
AddisMercato | 722,665 | X-Cart | B2C | No | Marketplace | Yes |
MercatoOnline | 857,130 | Custom (Angular) | B2C | No | Marketplace | No |
The most visited ecommerce websites in Ethiopia reveal an ecosystem still heavily dominated by Classifieds (40%) which is usually a sign of early stages of e-commerce development. But Marketplaces are also accounting for 40% of the top website showing a clear engagement of the consumers and providers into transactional e-commerce. None of the websites are exporting and this is due to the difficult foreign currency restrictions and the export requirements of receiving a payment on a local bank before exporting. In terms of technologies used to develop these websites WordPress is leading with 40% of the websites (higher than world average of 25%).
Global E-Marketplaces Presence of local sellers (Benchmark with Thailand)
Name | Ethiopia | Thailand | Number of | Query to reproduce results |
Alibaba.com | 696 | 8,021 | Seller | Ethiopia + Filter Supplier Country: Ethiopia |
EuroPages.com | 61 | 67 | Seller | Ethiopia + Country: Ethiopia |
eBay.com | 358 | 1,067,011 | Listings | Ethiopia + Advanced search filter location: Ethiopia |
Etsy.com | 32 | 14,081 | Listings | Dress + All Filters > Shop Location: Ethiopia |