With its first Growth & Transformation Plan (GTP I), the Ethiopian Textile Industry Development Institute (ETIDI) could manage to export goods worth only US $ 456 million against the set target of US $ 1 billion. The reason for missing the target by more than half is primarily because of the low cotton production. The plan to cultivate cotton on 265,000 ha of land by the end of 2014/15 as an improvement from 75,000 ha in 2010/11 failed as it managed to produce only on 125,000 ha.
Lack of diversification in products, quality and limited productivity were few other reasons for the export performance according to the report by the institute. The plan of improving the average productivity capacity usage of textile factories from 40 per cent in 2010/11 to 90 per cent by 2014/15 also failed as it could only grow to 67 per cent by 2014/15.
