Ethiopian Airlines Group Chief Executive Officer Mesfin Tasew at a news conference. The Reporter published the photo with its October 2026 story and did not say when or where it was taken. [file photo] (Photo: The Reporter via X)
Ethiopian Airlines paid about six million dollars for carbon credits in the 2025/26 fiscal year, its chief executive said, as global emissions rules and new taxes add costs for African airlines.
Group Chief Executive Officer Mesfin Tasew spoke on Thursday at the fourth East African Community In-House Counsel Convention in Addis Ababa, according to The Reporter, which published his remarks on Saturday. The two-day meeting of company lawyers, regulators and business leaders opened on October 8 at the Ethiopian Skylight Hotel, the East Africa Law Society said on X.
“We are expected to buy carbon according to the industry and we are buying carbon every year to compensate for what we release,” Mesfin told the delegates. “We pay millions of dollars every year. Last year it was around six million dollars, but in the coming years it will grow faster.”
The airline did not publish a separate statement on the payment, and The Reporter did not say how many tons of carbon credits the money bought or from which projects. Mereja could not find a breakdown in the airline’s public posts on X, which on Saturday and Sunday were about flights and promotions.
The payments come from the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation, known as CORSIA. The International Civil Aviation Organization, the UN agency for civil aviation, runs the scheme to limit the growth of carbon dioxide emissions from international flights. For the period from 2024 to 2035, the scheme sets a baseline equal to 85 percent of 2019 emissions. Airlines must buy credits to offset emissions above that line.
Mesfin said that the rules are becoming a heavy cost for the carrier, which is the largest airline in Africa. He also complained that the system is fragmented. CORSIA is meant to be one global standard, but The Reporter said he told the convention that several African countries are adding their own carbon charges outside the framework of the International Civil Aviation Organization.
Airlines hope that sustainable aviation fuel, which can be blended with normal jet fuel and used in existing aircraft, will cut emissions over the long term. But the fuel is expensive and hard to find. The International Air Transport Association, the global airline industry group, expects world production of sustainable aviation fuel to reach 2.4 million tons in 2026, which is about 0.8 percent of all jet fuel used.
Mesfin said the fuel is almost impossible to get in Africa. “When we bring it, if it is available, we’ll buy it. But it’s not available,” he said.
He also pointed to consumer protection rules in Europe and North America, which he said add more legal work for airlines that fly to many countries. He also raised strong concerns about taxes. Mesfin said governments in Africa, Europe, North America and Asia keep adding new levies, and that some African countries are making unusual or backdated demands. He gave one example in which a country asked the airline to pay taxes going back to 1970. The Reporter did not name the country.
Industry figures support his complaint about cost. According to the African Airlines Association, passengers paid an average of 68 dollars in taxes, fees and charges on international departures from African countries in 2024. The average was 63.32 dollars in East Africa and 109.49 dollars in West Africa. The International Air Transport Association says government taxes and infrastructure charges make it about 15 percent more expensive to run an airline in Africa than the global average.
Klock Aviation, a Nairobi account that writes about aviation and business travel in Africa, made the same point on X on Friday. It said jet fuel in Africa can cost about 17 percent more than the global average, while taxes, fees and charges can take 35 to 40 percent of the price of a ticket. “The result: short intra-African flights can become surprisingly expensive,” it wrote.
Fuel is the other pressure. On October 8, Mereja reported that oil prices had jumped 40 percent in two months, which raises Ethiopia’s fuel import bill.
The convention where Mesfin spoke brought together general counsel, heads of legal departments and company secretaries from across East Africa. Mwanje Gideon, a Ugandan lawyer and author of a book on refugee law in East Africa, wrote on X that the meeting was “a truly pan-African convergence of corporate counsel, regulators, bar leaders, and business executives.” The Reporter shared its story about the airline’s carbon payments on X on Sunday morning.
The airline’s warning about costs comes during a difficult period at home. Ethiopian Airlines resumed flights between Addis Ababa and Mekelle on Sunday after a two-week suspension, the state news agency ENA reported, and flights to Axum and Shire are expected to resume soon. The airline had halted the route after fighting resumed in Tigray in late September.
Mesfin did not say how much the airline expects to pay for carbon credits in the current fiscal year. The Reporter said his remarks echo wider calls by the airline industry for governments to review the financial burden they place on air transport.
Sources: