Ethiopia, on the Horn of Africa, with a population of more than 60 million, is one of the world's poorest countries. Ethiopia has strong historical and cultural roots in its ancient civilisation and Orthodox Christianity. Today, unfortunately, it seems to be afflicted frequently, and with shortening intervals, by droughts and famines which then briefly make their way into the headlines of international news. Large parts of the population live in remote rural areas, far away from any roads or towns, and depend on subsistence farming and a variety of small-scale commercial activities. Major constraints on economic development have included the politically unstable situation - the fratricidal war with Ethiopia in the North has left its traces, and there has been recurrent ethnically motivated unrest in the South -, outdated methods of farming and inefficient organisational structures. Even in "good" years with plenty of rainfall, some 12% of the population, especially in the North of the country, depend on food aid from abroad. Due to traditional cultural factors, the women and children are particularly disadvantaged segments of society. Women's access to education, food, income-generating opportunities etc. is more limited, and they do not enjoy the same rights as the men. In addition, the women are frequently subjected to human rights violations such as genital mutilation (more than 90%), arranged child marriages, systematic abduction, rape etc.

One of MISEREOR's priority areas of promotion therefore is gender and women's development. Apart from the co-funding of specific nationwide or diocesan programmes or centres for the advancement of women, gender has been gaining increasing importance as a cross-cutting theme in all other MISEREOR-supported programmes, too.

Further priority areas of promotion include rural development, urban infrastructure/community development, vocational training, and small enterprise promotion. Since November 2003, MISEREOR has been running a consultancy office in Addis Ababa with a consultant for rural development and organisational capacity-building.

MISEREOR's partners in Ethiopia mainly include diocesan institutions, religious congregations and some non-Church NGOs; there has been especially close cooperation with 5 of the 10 Catholic Ethiopian Dioceses. It is not least due to her merits gained in development work that the Catholic Church in Ethiopia today enjoys a much higher standing and significance in the country than might be expected considering the relatively small number of faithful - only 0.5% of the population are Catholics.