The Institute for Gender Studies (IGS), formerly the Centre for Research and Training on Women in Development (CERTWID), was established in 1991 as a unit within the Institute of Development Research (IDR) at the Addis Ababa University. IGS is currently the only institution for the study of women and gender in the country. IGS has undertaken and sponsored several researches on gender related issues (http://www.aau.edu.et/index.php/igs-home).

The Institute for Development Research (IDR) is a research institute with the mission to promote teaching and research in social sciences. Since its establishment in 1972, its focus has been rural development (http://www.aau.edu.et/research/idr/). 

The Forum for Social Sciences (FSS) was set up by a group of academics and professionals in 1998. It has two main objectives: the pursuit of independent policy research and the provision of public fora for debates and consultations on policy issues. Its main aim is to foster policy-making options for democratization and development in the country (http://www/fssethiopia.org.et/au.htm).

The Ethiopian Women’s Lawyers Association (EWLA) is a non-profit and non-partisan voluntary organization, founded by a group of Ethiopian women lawyers in 1995 following the ratification of the Constitution of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia. The objective of the EWLA is to promote the economic, political, social and legal rights of women under the Constitution of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia and other international human rights conventions (http://www.etwla.org/about.htm). 

The East African Sub-regional Support Initiative for the Advancement of Women (EASSI) is a subregional civil society organization, founded in 1996, for the advancement of women in Burundi, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Somalia, Tanzania and Uganda (http://www.eassi.org).

LandNet Africa, founded in 2000, provides a network on land tenure and policy issues in Africa for the promotion of people-centred land policies for the enhancement of sustainable livelihoods in Africa (http://ossrea.net/projects/landenet.htm).

Other regional organizations exist, such as the Tigray Women’s Association, with the objective of improving the livelihoods of women (12) (http://www.tigraywomen.org/tigraywomen/).

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