Ethiopian Veterinary Association (EVA) is an autonomous non-for-profit professional membership organization in Ethiopia, established on June 22, 1974 through the initiative of 13 visionary veterinarians. The association is a member of the World Veterinary Association. It has a mandate of promoting and strengthening the veterinary profession, respect professional ethics and code of conduct, and above all to safeguard the right of veterinarians. Moreover, EVA has been contributing to the emergence of efficient, effective and competitive livestock industry in Ethiopia. The association is dedicated to policy advocacy, development, promotion, and dissemination of knowledge and good practices in the livestock sector and serving the interest of the society.

The association is registered and accorded legal personality with Registry Number 0495 as local organization in accordance with the Civil Society Organizations Proclamation no. 1113/2019 (First registration occurred in 2009). The association has close to 2000 members involved in different sectors of the profession. 

Through the EU-funded  HEARD Project (Health of Ethiopian Animals for Rural Development Project), EVA  would like to commission a qualified consultant to study and design a comprehensive, internationally acceptable standard methodological framework ( indicators) to be employed to determine the current and future veterinary services coverage of Ethiopia.

Hide gained from cattle and skins from goats and sheep are important economic products contributing to the largest share of the total agricultural export commodities of Ethiopia (FAO, 2005). Based on annual offtake rates of 7% for cattle, 33% for sheep, and 35% for goats, the production stood at 3.78 million cattle hides, 8.41 million sheep skins, and 8.42 million goat skins in 2012/13 (CSA,2013). The 7% offtake rate for cattle falls significantly below the African average of 12.71% and the world average of 20.31%.

The hide and skin sector of Ethiopia  has been the highest source of foreign exchange for our country and generated a number of employment opportunities along its value chain. In the 1980s and 1990s skin and hide used to be the second highest foreign currency source for Ethiopia. In 2002 hides and skins represent major source of foreign exchange earnings for the country accounting for 14-16% of the total export revenue. In 2011, Ethiopia earned 139.28 million USD from the export of finished leather, shoes, garments, and gloves to foreign countries (CSA, 2011). In the 2016/17 fiscal year, Ethiopia earned only USD140 million from the export of leather and leather products.

During holidays, most Ethiopians consume more meat and therefore create and supply more fresh hides from slaughter of cattle, sheep and goats. However, there is mismatch between demand and supply of the commodity. Currently, Farmer’s, meat consumer’s and butcher’s hide and skin are rejected and/ or they are sold with lower price. The contribution of this sub sector to the current country’s economy is not as expected despite the large livestock population. The production of hide and skin in the subsector is constrained by various structural, production, information exchange, and quality problems, as well as financial constraints.

Regardless of the wide-ranging efforts made to improve quality and marketing of hide and skin in Ethiopia, hide and skin marketing and its export earnings performance continued to drop affecting loss of employment and export earnings from these commodities. Hide and skin production and the efficiency of the market needs to be critically studied. Therefore, the main objective of this study is to examine the root cause of hide and skin production downgrading and marketing inefficiency of the subsector and forward practically feasible strategic recommendations and measures that need to be taken to revive the hide and skin subsector of the country.

3. General Scope of the Assignment

• The consultancy service will be responsible to undertake in-depth study on major causes of down grading and marketing of hide and skin commodity at National level and forward recommendations and strategic measures that need to be taken to improve the performance of the subsector.

For more and detailed information use the document linked below: 

ToR for hide and skin downgrading.docx

Qualifications and General Professional Experience

• A senior consultant(s) with a minimum MSc/PhD in veterinary medicine, Business Management, agricultural economics, livestock production and marketing and related disciplines.
• The consultant(s)  must have a minimum of 10 years hands on experience in hide and skin production and marketing areas in Ethiopia
• Familiarity with the current governance and institutional arrangement of hide and skin production and marketing in Ethiopia
• Proven experience in review and development of scientific studies in the area of hide and skin production and marketing
• Demonstrated ability to work in multi-cultural and multi-disciplinary team of experts and information/data providers;
• Working knowledge of the English language (speaking and writing);
• Proven Experience in  preparation of similar documents and reports;
• Excellent organizational, planning and communication skills;
• Proven experience in designing of practical and focused survey data collection, recording, management, analysis, interpretation and reporting formats;
• If the applicant is a firm, it should be legally registered and with a renewed license.

Arrangement of Meetings

• The consultancy service will make himself/herself available (at a date to be agreed mutually with the EVA) for a bilateral meeting to discuss on issues related to the assignment at the EVA Office. Moreover, the consultancy service will present inception report, study report and recommendation at a validation stakeholders’ workshop to be organized by the EVA prior to the final approval.