The Minister of Agriculture and Animal Resources, Dr Gerardine Mukeshimana, has said that the government of Rwanda is doing everything for serving the people but also looking at the sustainability of our land resources for the future generations.
"We have ambitious plans to keep growing the productivity of our lands to make sure that we can feed ourselves but also working hard so that whatever we’ve harvested doesn’t get lost,” she pointed out.
The minister made the statement on February 12, 2019 while attending the World Government Summit in Dubai. She was outlining the country's priorities and ambitions for generations to come as Rwandan officials were sharing the ‘Best Practices from Rwanda Leading Tourism and Agriculture.’
Given that Rwanda is small country with an average farm holding per household of around 0.5ha, the minister noted, it’s very challenging to make sure that we produce food for nutrition security but also generating income.
“It’s important that we invest in research, innovations and technologies that can increase the productivity. And we’ve been running policies that are meant to consolidate pieces of land to make an economic scale but also aggregating those small producers into cooperatives so that they can be linked to markets, supported to be able to add value to what they are doing, and invest in livestock,” the minister told participants to the summit.
She also added that the government is trying to attract youth in agriculture sector “because we believe that the more young generations come in, the more new technologies get injected in it. And we hope for the best.”
Traditionally, agriculture has been left to the less educated and skilled ones. And that is the reason why the Government of Rwanda is trying to bring in the more educated and youthful farmers.
“Whatever we do, we keep in mind the concept of profitability and high value crops,” she said.