Emdibir is a town south-west of
Addis Ababa, in the central part of
Ethiopia. Located in the
Gurage Zone of the
, this town has a latitude and longitude of and an elevation between 2130 and 2164 meters above sea level. It is the administrative center of
Cheha Cheha is one of the woredas in the Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples' Region of Ethiopia. This woreda is named after one of the sub-groups of the Sebat Bet Gurage, the Cheha. Part of the Gurage Zone, Cheha is bordered on the south by En ...
woreda.
According to the Gurage Zone local government, Emdibir is one of 12 towns with electrical power, one of 11 with telephone service and one of nine that have postal service. An all-weather road was built in 1963 by the
Gurage Road Association
The Gurage (, Gurage: ጉራጌ) are a Semitic-speaking ethnic group inhabiting Ethiopia.G. W. E. Huntingford, "William A. Shack: The Gurage: a people of the ensete culture" They inhabit the Gurage Zone, a fertile, semi-mountainous region in ce ...
, which connected Emdibir to
Addis Ababa through
Welkite and
Hosaena.
["Ethiopian Village Studies: Imbdibir"]
, Centre for the Study of African Economies (accessed 5 July 2009)
The seat of the
Ethiopian Catholic Eparchy of Emdeber
The Ethiopian Catholic Eparchy of Emdeber ( la, Emdeberen(sis)) is an eparchy (Eastern Catholic diocese) of the Ethiopian Catholic Church, a metropolitan Eastern Catholic Church. It is a suffragan of the Ethiopian Catholic Archeparchy of Addi ...
is located in this town.
History
In the early 1930s there was a Catholic mission of the
Capuchins, usually with a Père and a Frère; they did some medical work and had a school. During the
Italian occupation the mission was renamed "Missione della Consolata". The Emdibir market was held every Friday.
In
1984 drought affected almost every household in Emdibir: there was no rain, and the
enset in many households was affected by a plant disease known as ''chire''. Although it was insufficient, the community received aid in the form of clothes, maize, milk, butter and oil from the
Catholic Relief Service
Catholic Relief Services (CRS) is the international humanitarian agency of the Catholic community in the United States. Founded in 1943 by the Bishops of the United States, the agency provides assistance to 130 million people in more than 110 ...
, as well as some of the richer farmers in the area.
[
]
Demographics
Based on figures from the Central Statistical Agency
The Central Statistical Agency (CSA; Amharic: ማዕከላዊ ስታቲስቲክስ ኤጀንሲ) is an agency of the government of Ethiopia designated to provide all surveys and censuses for that country used to monitor economic and social growth ...
in 2005, Emdibir has an estimated total population of 4,057 of whom 1,992 are men and 2,065 are women.CSA 2005 National Statistics
, Table B.4 The 1994 national census reported this town had a total population of 2,239 of whom 1,103 were men and 1,136 were women.
References
{{reflist
Populated places in the Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples' Region