Arsi Zone

[3][4] Coffee has been a major cash crop in Arsi as early as 1912, when two Belgian companies were granted concessions of 1,464 hectares of land for cultivating coffee in the area of the current Zone.

After World War I, these companies encountered financial difficulties and merged, and harvested as much as 613 tons of coffee at their peak (1931-21).

[5] The Central Statistical Agency (CSA), reported that 2198 tons of coffee were produced in this zone in the year ending in 2005, based on inspection records from the Ethiopian Coffee and Tea authority.

[6] Based on the 2007 Census conducted by the CSA, this Zone has a total population of 2,637,657, of whom 1,323,424 are men and 1,314,233 women; with an area of 19,825.22 square kilometres, Arsi has a population density of 133.05.

[8] According to a May 24, 2004 World Bank memorandum, 4% of the inhabitants of Arsi have access to electricity, this zone has a road density of 45.0 kilometres per 1000 square kilometres (compared to the national average of 30 kilometres),[9] the average rural household has 1.2 hectare of land (compared to the national average of 1.01 hectare of land and an average of 1.14 for the Oromia Region)[10] and the equivalent of 1.1 heads of livestock.

The memorandum gave this zone a drought risk rating of 364.