Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia
Eastern Africa
Ancient · Highland · Proud
Ethiopia (officially Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia) is a country located in Eastern Africa. Its capital city is Addis Ababa, with other major cities including Dire Dawa and Mekelle. With a population of approximately 120M, the main language spoken is Amharic. The country covers an area of 1,104,300 km². The official currency is the Ethiopian birr (Br). Traffic drives on the right side.
Ethiopia follows its own calendar of 13 months and runs approximately 7–8 years behind the Gregorian calendar.
Addis Ababa serves as the political, cultural and economic heart of Ethiopia, positioned in Eastern Africa. As the seat of government and often the most populous city, it concentrates the country's main institutions, universities and cultural landmarks. Beyond the capital, major cities include Dire Dawa, Mekelle, Bahir Dar — each a hub of regional culture, economy and history. Addis Ababa at 2,355 metres is the highest capital in Africa, founded in 1886 by Emperor Menelik II and now housing the headquarters of the African Union in a position that reflects Ethiopia's symbolic significance as the only African nation that successfully resisted European colonisation at the 1896 Battle of Adwa.
With a population of approximately 120M, Ethiopia is a vibrant society with a rich mix of traditions and communities. The official language is Amharic, which reflects the country's cultural heritage and connects it with a wide international community. Internationally, Ethiopia is reached via the dialling code +251. Ethiopia's 80 ethnic groups speaking 90 languages navigate their identities within a federal structure explicitly designed around ethnicity — the Oromo, Amhara, Tigray, and Somali regional states representing historical cultures whose relationships with Ethiopian central authority have oscillated between integration and conflict across centuries.
Ethiopia spans 1,104,300 km², in the Eastern Africa subregion of Africa. Geographically centred around 8.0°N, 38.0°E, the country offers a diverse range of landscapes shaped by its location, climate and geology. Road traffic follows the right-hand rule, in line with surrounding Africa convention.
The official currency is the Ethiopian birr (Br), used for everyday transactions and commerce throughout the country. Ethiopia's economy is shaped by its geography, natural resources and trade relationships. Business and daily life operate under UTC+03:00, aligning the country with its regional neighbours.
The emblematic dish of Ethiopia is Injera & Wat. Injera — a spongy sourdough flatbread made from teff grain unique to Ethiopia — functions both as plate and utensil, with stews (wats) of spiced lentils, chickpeas, and meat arranged on its surface and torn off by hand in communal eating that makes sharing food literally inseparable from the meal's structure.
Long-distance running holds a special place in the heart of Ethiopia's national identity. Ethiopia has produced the world's greatest long-distance runners — Haile Gebrselassie, Kenenisa Bekele, and Tirunesh Dibaba among them — in a tradition rooted not in formal training facilities but in children running long distances to school at altitude, creating physiological adaptations that proved decisive against sea-level competitors.
The highest point in Ethiopia is Ras Dashen, rising to 4,550 metres above sea level. The Simien Mountains, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, are a dramatic basalt plateau eroded into a landscape of vertical escarpments and deep valleys that shelters the endemic Gelada baboon (the only grass-eating primate), the Ethiopian wolf (Africa's rarest canid), and the Walia ibex — three species found nowhere else on Earth.