A Government is an entity of a society exercising authority over its subjects, preferably with their compliance. It is however not always agreed by the citizens that the government is acting in their interest, this making the relation in-between them lacking in legitimacy. This presents problems not only for the stability of a country, but for the expansion of financial markets, limiting the sources of finding finance to invest in development and infrastructure as it limits financing from within.  In this paper I look at Ethiopia where the government is perceived to have a generally low legitimacy, in 2010 they lunched the GERD* bond to finance a hydropower station on the Blue Nile. Ethiopia has a small economy thus the government asked its citizens to purchase savings bonds into the project, as international financing was not an option due to geopolitics. As the GERD is a €3.3 billion project many Ethiopians have inverted one full month salary. The question addressed in this paper it that of the willingness in entering in to this scheme, this due to legitimacy concerns within the country. More precisely the research question is formulated: is there a justifiable concern of legitimacy when rapidly intensifying a bond market in a developing country in which freedom is limited?  To address this field interviews was conducted in Addis Ababa and analysed via Weber’s three types of pure authority this to indicate the correlation of legitimacy dominations in-between the government and the investors. It is found that the GERD has common legitimacy dominations by both actors and as such the expansion of the bond market through the GERD has the preconditions to increase the trust level in the Ethiopian government. This is needed to increase legitimacy in the government, stabilize the country and expand the financial markets further.

Ethiopia has been challenged by multidimensional poverty. However, it has the potential to minimize the threat through an integrated multipurpose development process. In this regard, hydropower has a significant role to reduce energy poverty and enhance the multipurpose use of natural resources efficiency. Hydropower is a source of clean, sustainable and renewable energy. It has a contribution to reducing carbon emission and maintaining environmental sustainability. In Ethiopia, it is the major source of electricity. The country is rich in natural resources, including water to produce energy, however, electricity supply is still uncertain. The data shows that the country has the potential to produce 50,000 MW energy from water resources. Yet, it exploited 3,822 MW in 2018, approximately 7.6 % of its potential. Moreover, the country faces issues with energy security. Additionally, water and food supply also face an uncertain future. In this case, the country has planned the growth and transformation plan I and II for 2015 and 2020 to increase the energy production to 10,000 MW and 17,000 MW energy respectively. Consequently, the government launched different multipurpose hydropower plant projects. This project focuses on the multipurpose use of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, particularly for the sustainable energy-water-food-ecosystem service nexus at the national level. I applied the combination of methods such as the energy-water-food-ecosystem nexus, the SWOT analysis and the sustainability assessment as they are suitable for the complexity of such a project. Indeed, the GERD has benefits for the country in producing renewable and clean energy, generating income and increasing the water storage capacity at the national level. However, the project neglected the values of ecosystem services integration with the dam and its sectors. As a result, the dam affected the existed terrestrial biodiversity and ecosystem. Therefore, the GERD had not been the well-prepared plan that considers institutional cooperation and sectoral integration to use for multipurpose function and its sustainability. In these regards, unless the dam to take proper management of the project and natural resources, the hydropower plant would not have been generating sustainable energy production. / <p>The paper shows that how to use the reservoir hydropower plant for multipurpose, such as for energy, water, food, ecosystem services integration at local level</p>

The aim of this essay is to examine how the foreign relationships of Ethiopia has developed as a result of the construction and filling of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam between 2011 and 2021. This essay therefore asks: How has Ethiopia’s foreign relations with the EU, Egypt, Sudan and China changed, have those relationships become more conflictual or cooperative, and how could potential changes be explained using a constructivist perspective? Constructivism is used as a means of explaining changes in the statements, positions and policies of these countries through concepts such as “norms” and “identities”. It additionally utilizes concepts from other studies such as “Hydro-hegemony”, “Benefit Sharing” and “Ethiopian renaissance”. It uses the BAR-scale from Wolf et al. (2003) to determine the different stages of Ethiopia’s relationships. The study concludes that Ethiopia’s relationship with the EU and China have progressed positively as a result of the GERD, and they have now started considering Ethiopia a more equitable partner for further cooperation. The relationship with Egypt and Sudan initially improved, with new Ethiopian norms of cooperation and equitable utilization becoming mainstay. However, Ethiopia’s unilateral action during recent events broke these norms, and has turned the relations conflictual once again.

The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) is a large hydropower project currently under construction in Ethiopia. Supposedly it will benefit the people of Ethiopia through an increased access to electricity, but it is also associated with complex political relations between Ethiopia and the neighbouring countries Egypt and Sudan. The aim of this thesis is to analyse the GERD project with regard to the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals and their 169 related targets, and to show what actions should be taken to improve the contribution of the GERD to sustainable development. A method developed for mapping synergies and trade-offs between targets in the SDGs was used. To identify how the GERD contributes to and/or hinders the fulfillment of the goals, published evidence was systematically searched. 83 synergies, 45 trade-offs and 16 instances when cooperation in the Nile River basin is needed were identified. By radically increasing the electricity access in Ethiopia and because of the dam itself, the GERD both potentially contributes to and hinders sustainable development in relation to environment, society and economy. Identified key actions to reinforce the synergies and minimise the trade-offs are to establish a secure and including cooperation between Ethiopia, Egypt and Sudan; to ensure increased transparency, public access to information and participatory processes; to investigate and carry out measures that benefit the ecology in the area; and to strengthen the positive outcomes of electrification through supplementary measures. / Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) är ett stort vattenkraftprojekt som är under uppbyggnad i Etiopien. Genom att radikalt öka tillgången till elektricitet förväntas GERD bidra positivt till det etiopiska samhället, men dammen är också associerad med komplicerade politiska relationer mellan Etiopien och grannländerna Egypten och Sudan. Målet med rapporten är att analysera GERD-projektet i förhållande till FN:s 17 Globala mål och dess 169 tillhörande delmål, samt att visa vilka åtgärder som bör vidtas för att GERD i större utsträckning ska bidra till en hållbar utveckling. En metod som utvecklats för att kartlägga synergier och målkonflikter mellan olika delmål av de Globala målen användes. För att undersöka hur GERD bidrar till och/eller förhindrar uppfyllandet av delmålen gjordes en systematisk sökning av publicerad litteratur. 83 synergier, 45 målkonflikter och 16 fall där dessa hänger ihop med att samarbete krävs i regionen identifierades. Genom att öka tillgången till elektricitet, och på grund av dammen i sig, potentiellt både bidrar till och förhindrar GERD hållbar utveckling i förhållande till miljö, samhälle och ekonomi. Identifierade nyckelåtgärder för att förstärka synergierna och minimera målkonflikterna är att etablera ett bestående samarbete mellan Etiopien, Egypten och Sudan; att säkerställa ökad transparens, deltagandeprocesser och allmän tillgång till information; att utreda och utföra åtgärder som är till nytta för områdets ekologi; och att förstärka de positiva resultaten av elektrifiering genom kompletterande åtgärder.