The impact of a railroad (and therefore ROI whether measured financially or just socially) is bound to be higher for Ethiopia, esp since it is the first and only to connect the landlocked country to a major sea port.
I mean, you are not wrong. But I don't see how that's a reply to my post. Also, to make it clear, I am (roughly) from the region, and the joke about Argentinian defaults was meant to be gently poking fun at their history with it, since LatAm and loans came up.
For a country with such low GDP the debt to GDP ratio is not a good indicator of its future. If the country's economy performs at all its GDP could go up multiple times. The situation is different for a middle income country such as Argentina. One can't reasonably expect Argentinian GDP to go up multiple times so the debt is a lot more onerous relative to the GDP. There is a well know "middle income trap" that is hard to escape. The economic upgrade required to move to the developed status from the middle income rung is much harder than what is required to move up from a very low base (really just "normalize") such as Ethiopia.
GDP per capita Argentina: $14715 (2013)
The impact of a railroad (and therefore ROI whether measured financially or just socially) is bound to be higher for Ethiopia, esp since it is the first and only to connect the landlocked country to a major sea port.