Abstract:

This article describes the Kaizen practices that have been observed in Ethiopia. Best experiences, learnings and challenges and opportunities will be discussed. It demonstrates the Kaizen approach in Ethiopia context has proven success in companies in terms of improving productivity and efficiency of the business operations. As it is now, there is also a huge opportunity of learning from the implementation of Kaizen in terms of identifying the exiting opportunities to scale up the best practices and improve in some areas where challenges have been encountered. The findings come from literature readings and secondary data analysis on the research conducted and the reports on the Kaizen implementation processes of the piloted companies. The employees and the management understood and applied Kaizen concepts and tools, and significantly improved key processes, for example, The findings of one of the research made on Kaizen in Ethiopia indicated that in one of the piloted projects of a company called Kadisco Chemical Industry in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, the implementation of the Kaizen culture was found to increase labor productivity by reducing, on average of 50%, time wastage for searching tools; improved a defect ratio which ranged from 50% to 70%; and improved lead time in the range of 16% to 90%.

Keywords: Kaizen; Ethiopia; Productivity; lead time; Kaizen Culture; Improvement.

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