Ethiopia

The parliamentary republic of Ethiopia with its capital Addis Ababa covers 1,104,300 km². The country is located in north-east Africa on the Horn of Africa and borders Eritrea to the north, Sudan and South Sudan to the west, Kenya to the south and Somalia and Djibouti to the east. From 980 BC until 1974, the country was also known as Abyssinia (more rarely Abyssinia). In 1974, the approximately 700-year rule of the Solomonic dynasty ended with a coup. Ethiopia is considered to be one of the countries of origin of modern man and the country of origin of coffee.

Viticulture

Grape wine has been known here since the 3rd century, but the national drink is honey wine. There are three climate zones depending on altitude. These are the tropical-hot zone up to 1,800 metres, in which two harvests are possible for fruit, the warm-temperate zone from 1,800 to 2,500 metres and the cool zone above 2,500 metres above sea level. At higher altitudes, the climate with sufficient rainfall is relatively suitable for viticulture. The first winery established here in 1943 was Awash in the capital Addis Ababa. In the meantime, the French trading company Castel Frères has also invested. In 2021, the vineyards covered 2,512 hectares, but the wine production volume was only 8,000 hectolitres. The majority of the land is used for table grapes. The grape variety index with the Celtic varieties (Kym Anderson statistics):