Interplay between investment laws and environmental laws in Ethiopia with regard to environmental protection

Abstract

Nowaday's investment activities have been increasing in an alarming speed. This is due to the undeniable fact of globalization which consecutively created highly favorable condition for MNCs to go to different corner of world to establish their plant, and invest on different sectors of economy. Some times while doing investment MNCs have been polluting air and failed to work in socially responsible manner. Due to this fact, there have been different move by the world society to protect environment. Despite these move, there still have gaps that should be filled immediately by cooperation of world community, especially by developed countries. Currently, in Ethiopia too, there are huge inflows of FDI and domestic investments due to the strong measure the current government has been taking to promote investment by adopting investment friendly laws. Besides, the government of Ethiopia has been enacting environmental protection laws. Hence, in Ethiopia, there are large amount of investment promoting laws and environmental protection laws. On one hand, the government has been turning every stone to achieve the goals of economic development, and on another hand it seems that there are moves toward protecting environment. However, balancing these two important agendas (development and environmental protection) highly requires commitment. This paper going to assess how much place and attention is being given for environmental protection by investment laws of the country, and the obligations that are set in environmental laws to investment activities. Furthermore, incompatibilities between selected investment laws and environmental laws will be analyzed. Finally, an attempt will be made to asses legal gaps, if any, on chosen investment and environmental laws of the country.