List of Towns, Villages and Cities in East Hararghe Zone

East Hararghe Zone (Afaan Oromoo: Godina Harargee Bahaa) is a zone of eastern Oromia, administered from Harar. The 2007 census counted 2,723,850 people across 17,935 square kilometres, a density of 152 per square kilometre and among the highest in the region. It is Ethiopia’s main chat-growing area, and the walled city of Harar sits inside it as an enclave of the Harari Region.

Woredas (Districts)

The zone has 18 rural woredas. Figures are the 2007 census count and the 2022 projection.

Major Towns

Awaday, a few kilometres from Haramaya on the Harar road, is small in resident population but handles the largest chat trade in the Horn of Africa. Funyan Bira, Gursum, Fedis, Girawa and Kersa are the other woreda seats with significant weekly markets.

Geography

East Hararghe is a plateau cut by the Ahmar Mountains, which run east to west across the north of the zone and reach 3,392 metres at Gara Muleta. Land falls away south and east into the Somali lowlands, and streams there drain toward the Wabe Shebelle and the Fafan. Rainfall is bimodal, and the mid-altitude belt between 1,600 and 2,200 metres carries almost all the farming population.

The zone borders West Hararghe Zone to the west, Bale Zone to the south-west, Dire Dawa to the north, and the Somali Region to the north and east. The Harari Region is an enclave within it.

Demographics

The 2007 census recorded 1,383,198 men and 1,340,652 women, an increase of 48.79 per cent on 1994. Afaan Oromoo was the first language of 97.6 per cent of residents. Muslims made up 96.51 per cent of the population and Ethiopian Orthodox Christians 3.12 per cent, the highest Muslim share of any Oromia zone. Later totals published for the zone are projections, not counts.

Economy & Local Life

Chat is the cash crop that shapes the zone. Terraced plots across Haramaya, Kersa, Meta and Kombolcha supply Awaday market, from which trucks run overnight to Dire Dawa, Djibouti and the Somaliland border. Growers get several harvests a year and prices well above cereal returns, and chat has steadily displaced sorghum on the better land. Coffee is the second cash crop, about 3,654 tonnes in 2005. Sorghum, maize, groundnuts, sweet potato and vegetables fill the food-crop calendar, and cattle and goats are kept on the drier margins.

Haramaya University, founded in 1954 as Alemaya College of Agriculture, is the largest institution in the zone and one of Ethiopia’s oldest universities. Lake Haramaya, once the town’s water source, dried up in the mid-2000s under irrigation and catchment pressure, and recovery work continues. Babile Elephant Sanctuary and the eroded rock pillars of the Dakata valley, known locally as the Valley of Marvels, lie east of Babile town.

Getting There

Harar is about 510 kilometres from Addis Ababa on asphalt, running east through Adama, Awash and Dire Dawa. Buses take the better part of a day. Dire Dawa, 50 kilometres north-west of Harar, has the nearest airport with daily flights and is the closest station on the Addis Ababa–Djibouti railway. From Harar, roads run east to Babile and Jijiga and west along the ridge through Kombolcha, Kersa, Meta and Deder toward Chiro.

FAQ

Where is East Hararghe Zone?

East Hararghe is in eastern Oromia, about 510 kilometres from Addis Ababa, wrapped around the Harari Region and bordering the Somali Region.

What is the capital of East Hararghe Zone?

Harar. The city itself is the separate Harari Region, but it houses the zone administration.

How many woredas are in East Hararghe Zone?

Eighteen.

What language is spoken in East Hararghe?

Afaan Oromoo, the first language of about 98 per cent of residents.

What is Awaday?

A town in Haramaya woreda that hosts the largest chat market in the Horn of Africa, supplying Djibouti and Somaliland by overnight road freight.

Where is Haramaya University?

At Haramaya, formerly Alemaya, about 20 kilometres west of Harar on the Dire Dawa road.