Employment
Labour Proclamation 1156/2019, with a separate regime for civil servants
Proclamation 1156/2019 replaced the 2003 labour law, raising severance entitlements, extending maternity leave to 120 days and creating a wage board. Federal civil servants fall outside it, under separate public-service legislation.
Key rules
- Jurisdiction — National, administered by the Ministry of Labour and Skills; labour disputes go to labour relations boards and then to the courts.
Governing law
- Labour Proclamation 1156/2019
- Federal Civil Servants Proclamation 1064/2017
- Private Organisations Employees Pension Proclamation 715/2011
In practice
The 2019 proclamation is the operative text and it changed several numbers that older summaries get wrong: maternity leave rose from 90 to 120 days, probation was capped at 60 working days, and severance on unlawful termination was increased. It also established a national wage board with a mandate to set a minimum wage — Ethiopia has historically had no statutory national minimum wage in the private sector, and at the time of review the board's rate-setting had not produced a binding general figure, so the honest statement is that the mechanism exists rather than that a minimum wage is in force. Industrial action is lawful but heavily conditioned on exhausting conciliation, and essential-services designations are broad. The industrial parks that anchor the export garment sector sit under the same proclamation, though their labour conditions have attracted particular scrutiny over wage levels and turnover.