Bestfoot Forward

Chinese shoemaker injects pace into Ethiopia’s manufacturing sector

Dri vin g approximately 30 km out from Bole International Airport in Addis Ababa, the city’s Eastern Industrial Zone comes into sight. The vast area is home to some 20 Chinese-invested companies, ranging in diversity from shoemaking, textile and garments to automobile, steel, cement and packaging.

Huajian International Shoe City (Ethiopia) Plc, a subsidiary of the Chinese shoemaker Huajian Group, is the largest employer in the zone.

Demis Degef, a 27-year-old Ethiopian known locally as “Shanghai (also the name of China’s economic center),” has been with Huajian for six years.

Speaking fluent Chinese, he told Chinafrica that he has learnt a lot since joining the company. “Apart from advanced shoemaking skills, I have learnt the Chinese language and culture, management skills and Huajian’s corporate culture,” said Demis, now a production line supervisor. He received a year’s training at Dongguan, south China’s Guangdong Province, where Huajian is headquartered.

Behind him, thousands of workers dressed in the company’s green T-shirt uniform are busy cutting, gluing and stitching quality shoes on the production lines.

Demis said his Chinese moniker was given by Huajian Group’s legendary Founder and Chairman Zhang Huarong, who built the shoemaking empire from scratch in the 1980s. According to Zhang, a personal call for more investment by the late Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi during a visit to China in August 2011 is what initially motivated Huajian to invest in the country.

The company’s increased investment in Ethiopia has seen the exponential success of shoemaking become one of the most important pillars of the China- Ethiopia partnership.

Besides, against a background of China deepening its reform and opening up, some Chinese producers are shifting part of their production lines to Ethiopia to tap new markets. Huajian has also taken advantage of this.

Founded in 1996, the Huajian Group, one of the world’s biggest manufacturers of women’s shoes, makes shoes mostly for the U. S. and European markets for brands such as Guess, Nine West and Naturalizer.

Receiving ample support from both governments, the group’s Ethiopian subsidiary opened in January 2012. Currently, shoes made by this factory accounts for more than 50 percent of the Ethiopian footwear export value, which also facilitates such viable spin- offs as leather processing, transportation, and logistics.

The factory now makes about 3 million pairs of shoes annually. Its footwear exports exceeded $80