A visit to the Addis Ababa Abattoir

Written by Lonny (April 28, 2010)

Today we met with Tsehay at the Land O Lakes office with Debay and Georgia.  It is exciting to hear their plans for their land near Chancho.  We spent a couple of hours discussing the dairy industry and formulating plans.  We ran out of time before we ran out of material so we will have to meet again.

This afternoon Ayanew took us to the Addis Ababa Abattoir where he used to work.  It was obvious that he was loved by all there from the manager to the line workers.  The facility is monstrous for Ethiopian standards.  They kill between 1000 and 2000 head a day and reach 3000 as the fasting season ends in April.  The butcher shops buy the animals and present them at the abattoir where they are slaughtered then sent to the shop. It was very interesting.

This evening Abera and I met again with Tsehay to discuss the Kokosa property.  It became a brainstorming and information sharing discussion that lasted two hours.  We decided that we all needed to do a little more homework and some number crunching to be able to put together a good plan to present to Paul.  Tsehay and Abera helped each other see the others perspective which was helpful in generating and evaluating ideas.