invoicing as AfDB warns domestic revenue gaps threaten economic transformation
The African Development Bank reports that Ethiopia lost $24.6 billion to trade mis-invoicing between 2013 and 2022, hindering economic development. The bank suggests that strengthening digital customs and institutional oversight is essential to closing the country's financing gap.
Why it matters
Illicit financial flows significantly undermine the fiscal capacity of developing nations, making it harder to fund infrastructure and economic transformation.
Ethiopia lost an estimated US$24.6 billion through trade mis-invoicing between 2013 and 2022, according to the African Development Bank (AfDB) , underscoring how illicit financial flows continue to erode public revenues needed to finance infrastructure, industrialisation and long-term economic transformation. The findings, published in the bank’s East Africa Economic Outlook 2026 , identify trade mis-invoicing as a major structural weakness at a time when Ethiopia faces rising debt obligations, growing investment needs and ongoing macroeconomic reforms.
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