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Illicit financial flows in Ethiopia

Over the past decade, the concept of illicit financial flows (IFFs) has gained traction within the international development community. According to some calculations, illicit outflows from Africa, for example, surpass the levels of development aid received by the continent, which deprives countries from resources needed to fund public services, improve infrastructure and fuel economic growth. There is, however, a lack of clarity regarding the definition of IFFs, which makes them difficult to delineate, measure and study. This U4 Helpdesk Answer explores the issue of IFFs in Ethiopia.

20 September 2018
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Illicit financial flows in Ethiopia

Main points

  • According to GFI’s estimations, between 2005 and 2014, an estimated average of US$1,259 million to US$3,153 million dollars left Ethiopia as IFFs every year.
  • IFFs in Ethiopia have led to an average loss in GDP growth of 2.2% per year.
  • Data from Global Financial Integrity shows that between 55 and 80% of the illicit financial outflows leaving Ethiopia originate through trade mis-invoicing.
  • Ethiopia’s response to curb IFFs has been largely based on a legal approach, which has proven difficult to implement in practice.

Cite this publication


Kukutschka, R. (2018) Illicit financial flows in Ethiopia. Bergen: U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute (U4 Helpdesk Answer 2018:10)

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Roberto Martinez B. Kukutschka

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All views in this text are the author(s)’, and may differ from the U4 partner agencies’ policies.

This work is licenced under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

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