Agriculture is the cornerstone of Rwanda’s economic transformation, employing 80% of the country’s population of 11 million people and providing 35% of the Gross Domestic Product of 5,6 billion US$. The government has strongly promoted the sector’s productivity by means of land consolidation policies and prioritising certain high potential crops. Land is very scarce in this overpopulated and hilly country.
Policies are oriented both towards developing market-oriented smallholder agriculture and towards creating off-farm employment to create space for commercial farming on bigger plots. To achieve the latter, Rwanda is quickly reforming its economy and business regulations. These reforms have made the country (after South Africa) the second best country to do business in Africa.
Agri-ProFocus Rwanda Agri-Hub started in 2009 with a practical collaboration of Dutch Agri-ProFocus members in a joint programme on Agri-Business Cluster development, called IPER (Initiative de Promotion de l’Entrepreneuriat Rural). Since 2012, Agri-ProFocus Rwanda has been organised in thematic groups called ‘innovation communities’ that organise activities to improve the support system for entrepreneurial farmers. In 2013, the Rwanda Agri-Hub had Innovation Communities on Agricultural Finance, ICT for Agriculture, Agri-Business Cluster Development, Farm-Firm relations and Gender in Value Chains.
The network has booked encouraging results in terms of increased market access, productivity and interaction between actor groups. This helps to create opportunities for scaling up the approach to a larger number of clusters and commodities.
For more information, visit the online platform here.
From November 10 till November 13, Lilianne Ploumen, Minister of Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation will go on an economic mission to Kinshasa, DR Congo (10-11) and Kigali, Rwanda (12-13). The mission will focus on the following sectors: agri-business; renewable energy; infrastructure, maritime and port development. Hedwig Bruggeman, managing director of AgriProFocus will be one of the participants in this mission.
The Agribusiness Market Linkages Event that took place in Rubavu District from October 23rd-24th 2014 was the 5th organized by AgriProFocus Rwanda since 2011 and attracted over 2000 farmers.
Within 10 days, 3 Agri-Finance Fairs have been held in Burundi (August 22-23), Rwanda (August 28-29) and DR Congo (August 28-30). Busy times for the Great Lakes region! Burundi In Burundi the fair was organised in a high seminary near the very small village of Kyama, Brururi. This site had been chosen to see the […]
Quail and Rabbit farming in Rwanda Introducing Quail farming to Rwanda WSA Innovations Company Profile Seeking bottles of 50 ml We are looking for a consultant We have moved to our new online platform! This website is now closed for new contributions Planting trees Trade Mission of The Netherlands to Rwanda SUSTAINABLE HOT PEPPER BUYERS NEEDED