Analysis of the Changing Functional Structure of Major Urban Centers of Ethiopia

Abstract

The study attempted to analyze the patterns of the changing functional structure of major urban centers of Ethiopia over the period of 2009 to 2012. An economic base, export employment multiplier and shift share analysis were used to identify the basic sectors, the export employment and expanding and declining industries in fifteen major urban centers. The location quotient results showed that there have been changes in economic bases, for twelve out of fifteen urban centers. The major sources of export employment were construction, distributive and social services for most of the towns considered. Export employment analysis has indicated that some towns of leading regions have relatively higher percentage of export employment compared to others. In general, the major drivers of the urban employment growth in many urban centers over the study period were found to be distributive, social and extractive sectors. However, the role of the transformative economic sectors, particularly the manufacturing sector is not as such encouraging for many towns. Against this back drop, the analysis surfaced local economic development issue such as how the towns included in this study could capitalize more on the transformative economic sectors through various incentive mechanisms.

Keywords: Urban Functions, Basic Employment, Employment Multiplier, Location Quotient, Shift Share Analysis