Sand is a naturally produced material resulting from thernmechanical and chemical breakdown of rocks. Sand is the most commonrnand loosely packed mineral on the earth's surface. Sand particles mostlyrnrange from 0.02 mm to 2.00 mm in diameter. Silica sand is the termrnused to describe sand that has a very high percentage of silicon dioxidern(SiO2).rnIn the field of civil engineering, silica sand is used for severalrnpurposes like, in construction, in industries for the production ofrndifferent construction materials. Sand, which is graded according to arnspecified standard, is used for testing of Portland cement and concrete,rnin field density determination using sand replacement method, and inrnwater and sewage treatment plants as a filter media.rnDue to lack of standard silica sand in Ethiopia, the country isrnlosing high foreign currency by importing standard silica sand fromrnabroad. The purpose of this research is the identification of the differentrnsources of sand in different parts of the country for the purpose ofrnstandard sand production.rnTo achieve the research objective, sand samples for laboratoryrninvestigation and field test were collected from North Showa (Jema riverrnvalley) and Dire Dawa town.rnVisual inspection, index property tests, test for impurities andrnchemical contents were conducted on both samples. Sand replacementrnand mortar test were done to check the applicability of the local samplesrn9rnin field density determination and in testing of Portland cementrnrespectively.rnGrain size analysis and impurity test results revealed that bothrnlocal sand samples cannot be used as standard sand as they arerncollected directly from their natural places. Thus, inorder to be used asrnstandard sands both samples must be washed, oven dried, sieved andrnseparated to various size fractions and mix each fraction according tornthe grading requirement.rnIn all of the test results, the compressive and flexural strength ofrnmortar cubes made with local samples gave lower values compared tornthat of imported sand. However, a relatively uniform trend wasrnobserved both in the compressive and flexural test results between thernlocal samples and the imported one.rnThe field density test by sand replacement method showed that,rnboth local sand samples gave the same result with the imported Ottawarnstandard sand in almost all test locations irrespective of the silicarncontent.rnLaboratory and field tests conducted on both local sand samplesrnshowed that there is a high possibility that both local sand samples canrnreplace the imported standard sand.