Artificial Intelligence Ignites in Ethiopia B Ethiopia has come a long way from its nightmare past of famine and war. Today it's well known that it has one of the highest GDP's in Africa. is Africa's largest recipient of developmental aid and the 3'd largest recipient of foreign investment. Little is known however about the computer science thriving from its capital, Addis Ababa. and of course nothing of the fact that its artificial intelligence is on fire. The foundation for artificial intelligence (Al) in bandwidth-barren Ethiopia comes not so much commercial growth where less than 2% have access to the Internet, but from the despotic government's fervent development of higher education, makeshift emblems to support its massive multi-billion dollar industrial plans. Today, there arc over 30 official universities and 130 or so polytechnics or institutes, most of them emphasizing technology. Many of them are in the capital. and in 2012, the Ministry of Science and Technology established its own university resulting in two major science and tech universities in and near Addis Ababa. Behind all the tech glitz however and the government's plans for a S250 million dollar tech park in Addis Ababa. only 34% of Ethiopian children enroll into the equivalent of 9th grade according to world indexes, early adult literacy is approximately 35%. child labor at 27%, girl marriage at an appalling 41%, and the country still ranks near the bottom of the UNDP's World Index for quality of life. But in the capital, education rates are warpedly improved and with 70% of the population under the age of 29, what's emerging is an urban sub-culture of keen young, English speaking software engineers with few private sector opportunities but to program for the outside world. And program they do at a fraction of the cost: today, the Ministry of Trade and Industry 'affirms' more than 700 licensed companies in computer technology and 95 software businesses serving customers worl