Chinese Ambassador to Rwanda Henry Rao Hongwei has committed himself to do his best to attract potential investors and buyers of Rwanda’s tea and coffee from his country by providing them with more information on available opportunities in tea and coffee sectors.
The Chinese ambassador made the commitment on November 24, 2018 while heading a delegation of 25 staff members from the Chinese Embassy in Kigali during a visit to Rwanda Farmers Coffee Company (RFCC), a coffee roasting plant based at National Agricultural Export Development Board (NAEB) headquarters in Kigali.
The visit was meant to get an overview on Rwandan Coffee Industry and its development plan on future Chinese Market, the source of roasted coffee exported to China and getting to know coffee exporters expectations.
Last month, Rwanda and Alibaba Group – China’s biggest e-commerce company signed a marketing partnership.
“In my understanding Rwanda is well known in China for its high quality coffee, and of course tea. I do believe in near future there will be a big market, a big potential for Coffee and Tea produced in Rwanda,” said Ambassador Hongwei.
Sandrine Urujeni, the Deputy Chief Executive Officer at NAEB said that exportation of roasted coffee to China is still in trial phase, but developing gradually.
“We appreciate the current stage of this partnership and we are increasing efforts after we finished the first phase of trial where we have had three companies working with Alibaba. We are planning for the second phase to add-in more coffee production companies as we have many roasters in the country,” Urujeni said.
Benjamin Nkurunziza, Sales and Marketing Manager of RFCC said that recently they exported 1,600 packets of Rwanda roasted coffee weighing 550 Kgs. RFCC which spearheads other Rwandan companies selling through Alibaba’s eWTP platform is expected to export 200 more Kgs next week and it is up on demand.
“The exportation of our coffee depends on orders, that’s why we hope the Chinese Embassy in Rwanda will help us to expand our roasted coffee markets in China,” he pointed out