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The second edition of Ethiopian Telecommunication
Corporation’s (ETC) telephone directory, for the
year 2009, prepared by Africa Phone Books, was
launched on Thursday July 22, 2010, a year later
than planned, at the Hilton Addis.
Africa Phone Books printed 100,000 directories,
70,000 in English and 30,000 in Amharic, and 200,000
CD-ROMs that are to be distributed free of charge.
They also introduced a website,
www.ethiopiabooks.com, for online users.
In print, the directory contains close to 7,000
businesses while the CD and website contain 1
million white page listings.
ETC used to print its own telephone directory but
selected Africa Phone Books for the preparation of
the directories four years ago, after it had floated
an international tender. The first directory
appeared in 2007 with 150,000 hard copies and 50,000
CD-ROMs.
“We chose to have more CDs than print copies because
everyone is using technology nowadays,” David Encel,
East Africa Manager of Africa Phone Books, told
Fortune. “We hired around 300 people to go
door-to-door in businesses around town and not only
gave them the CD but installed it and showed them
how it works.”
The company also introduced a free one-page website
hosting the online telephone directory for
businesses.
“This will increase the visibility of the companies
who use this opportunity,” Encel said. “If you do a
Google search, using key words like “construction
Ethiopia” our website will be show at the top.”
Africa Phone Books and ETC had agreed on the
publication of five directories, but the second one,
with the year 2009 on the cover, came out late due
to some contractual negotiations.
The new agreement, signed on December 4, 2008, keeps
Africa Phone Books as the official printer of ETC’s
telephone directory, but does away with payments.
As a result, the only income Africa Phone Books
generates is from the advertisements that businesses
place and pay for. A full-page colour advertisement
costs 98,000 Br while a small business card size one
costs between 8,000 and 10,000 Br, Fortune learned.
Although the next edition is slotted to appear in
September 2011, the listings on the website will be
updated every three to four months, according to
Encel.
The distribution of the print directory is done by
both ETC and Africa Phone Books. Although there are
other directories on the market that are distributed
free of charge, Africa Phone Books is the only one
who has access to the white page listings of around
one million businesses.
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Africa Phone Books remains the official printer but
receives no payment, only 
