The Ethiopian Shipping and Logistics Services Enterprise (ESLSE), known commercially as the Ethiopian Shipping Lines, is the national cargo

shipping Freight transport, also referred to as freight forwarding, is the physical process of transporting commodities and merchandise goods and cargo. The term shipping originally referred to transport by sea but in American English, it has been ...

company A company, abbreviated as co., is a Legal personality, legal entity representing an association of legal people, whether Natural person, natural, Juridical person, juridical or a mixture of both, with a specific objective. Company members ...

Ethiopia Ethiopia, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country located in the Horn of Africa region of East Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the north, Djibouti to the northeast, Somalia to the east, Ken ...

. Established in 1964, it has continued to operate despite Ethiopia having become a

landlocked country A landlocked country is a country that has no territory connected to an ocean or whose coastlines lie solely on endorheic basins. Currently, there are 44 landlocked countries, two of them doubly landlocked (Liechtenstein and Uzbekistan), and t ...

in 1993; its main base is now the

Port of Djibouti The Port of Djibouti is a port in Djibouti, the capital of Djibouti. It is strategically located at the crossroads of one of the busiest shipping routes in the world, linking Europe, the Far East, the Horn of Africa and the Persian Gulf. The port ...

and

Berbera Berbera (; , ) is the capital of the Sahil, Somaliland, Sahil region of Somaliland and is the main sea port of the country, located approximately 160 km from the national capital, Hargeisa. Berbera is a coastal city and was the former capital of t ...

Somaliland Somaliland, officially the Republic of Somaliland, is an List of states with limited recognition, unrecognised country in the Horn of Africa. It is located in the southern coast of the Gulf of Aden and bordered by Djibouti to the northwest, E ...

. Ethiopian Shipping and Logistics Services Enterprise is a subsidiary of Ethiopian Investment Holdings (EIH), the

sovereign wealth fund A sovereign wealth fund (SWF), or sovereign investment fund, is a state-owned investment fund that invests in real and financial assets such as stocks, Bond (finance), bonds, real estate, precious metals, or in alternative investments such as ...

of Ethiopia.

History

Ethiopia regained a coastline on the Red Sea when Eritrea was federated with Ethiopia in 1952. However, it was not until 1965 that the Ethiopian Shipping Lines was established as a joint venture with the American company Towers Perrin. A Dutch company was contracted to manage the line along the lines of the then-ongoing arrangement with TWA to manage the flag carrier airline Ethiopian Airlines. Operations commenced in 1966 with three ships called ''Queen of Sheba'', ''Lion of Judah'' and ''Lalibela''. The Line quickly faced serious challenges when the

Suez Canal The Suez Canal (; , ') is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, Indo-Mediterranean, connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea through the Isthmus of Suez and dividing Africa and Asia (and by extension, the Sinai Peninsula from the rest ...

was closed in 1967. Until Suez Canal was opened again, the vessels had to go all around the Cape. The size of the ships was not appropriate for such long voyages, and the company ran into a loss. Since then, the ESL has focused mainly on domestic import and export, to promote foreign trade. It has generally been profitable.

References

External links

Abiy Ahmed rings changes at helm of Ethiopia Shipping & Logistics Services Enterprise
Africa Intelligence, April 13, 2023 (requires free registration) Transport companies of Ethiopia Container shipping companies Companies based in Addis Ababa Transport companies established in 1965 {{Africa-company-stub

History

See also

References

External links