Author: Nicole Kamanzi Muteteri

ARC which stands for Affordable, Reliable and Clean solar electricity has been in operation in Rwanda since 2017 and has immediate plans to connect 16,000 of its citizens nationwide. The creation of the Solar Business Parks reflects ARC’s desire to further empower rural communities of Rwanda and facilitate the emergence of untapped local business potential.

ARC Power’s team on the ground is comprised of 95% Rwandan nationals and is now installing first time, grid-quality power to communities where commercial activity has hence far been limited due to a lack of electricity.

The first of the parks- located in Murama in the Bugesera District- has recently opened its doors for business. Originally sporting four units, soon to expand to seven, the Solar Business Park will provide a home for a locally owned bakery, tailors, milling station and a welding shop. By early 2021, a further two Parks will go live to the Rwandan public.

The Business Park operates a ‘plug-and-pay’ business model which allows local entrepreneurs to pay for the power used, and the space they occupy at the park, at an agreed rate. For their part, ARC Power will provide any machinery required by the entrepreneurs on finance and charge businesses a small rental fee for each unit.

Community engagement is at the heart of ARC Power’s work and residents will be consulted on their specific wants and needs before future Business Park plans are drawn up. Each site will therefore differ from the last and reflect the community it serves. It is not just about business, however, as ARC Power hopes to install an open-air cinema on the Murama site when Covid restrictions are lifted.

By the end of 2021, ARC Power plans to have at least 20 Solar Business Parks up and running to power the creation of more than a hundred new businesses across Rwanda.

Commenting on the development, CEO of ARC Power, Karl Boyce, said: “Our work has always been about empowering the people of Rwanda by providing a solution to a lack of reliable power in rural areas. Through ARC Power’s clean, sustainable and dependable mini-grids we are well on our way and the creation of our Solar Business Parks is a further indication of our long-term intentions.”

“It is one thing bringing power to rural areas, but we want to facilitate an expansion of commercial activities in these places, and by building Solar Business Parks and assisting budding local entrepreneurs with the cost of machinery, we hope to support the next wave of Rwandan businesses to build something meaningful,” he added.

Before she died, Nyirangoragoza who lived in Kabuga village, Nyarusange cell in Bushekeri sector in Nyamasheke district left a will bequeathing her piece of land to President Kagame.

Late Nyirangoragoza was born in 1947 in Nyarusange cell, Bushekeri sector in Nyamasheke district, Western Province. All her 10 children were killed during the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi along with her husband.

Nyirangoragoza fled to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) from where RPF Inkotanyi repatriated her.

Before she passed on, Nyirangoragoza gave testimonies on how President Kagame built a house for her and providing financial support after Genocide.

She said that Kagame is ‘wise’ because he took her to the community of her generation and built another decent house for Nyirangoragoza during advanced ages to put her out of loneliness.

“He took care of me on behalf of my children. That is why I must bequeath my possessions to him,” said Nyirangoragoza.

The property left to President Kagame include separate pieces of land of 168 and 776 square meters respectively along with 1259 square meters on which late Nyirangoragoza had houses.

They are located in the middle of pieces of land located in Mubuga village, Nyarusange cell, Bushekeri sector of Nyamashekle district.

The decision was meant to thank Kagame’s support after Genocide taking care, building a house and financial support yet family members had abandoned her.
The notarized will was handed to The Minister in the Office of the Presidency, Judith Uwizeye who represented President Kagame.

Uwizeye explained that the four pieces of land will be developed for infrastructure beneficial to the surrounding community.

“I am glad to be with you to receive the will Nyirangoragoza Marriane left to the President of the Republic. She decided to bequeath her possessions to His Excellency Paul Kagame because of joy for the support she received from the Government. On behalf of President Kagame, I am delighted to let you know that he accepts the will, he is grateful for that and thanks the widow,” she said.

Uwizeye explained that President Kagame accepted the will to keep the memory of Nyirangoragora’s kind heart.

“He decided to develop the land for infrastructure beneficial to the entire community in the sector. Details for the project will be announced after an assessment,” added Uwizeye.

Residents describe Marriane Nyirangoragoza as a kind person with good attributes the community.

Marianne Nyirangoragoza passed on in May 2020. She was living in Impinganzima in in Rusizi District during her advanced age. Impinganzima is one of hostels for elderly Genocide survivors built in different parts of the country by Imbuto Foundation, an initiative launched by First Lady Jeannette Kagame in collaboration with other stakeholders.

Nsengiyaremye, who was trafficking the narcotics on a motorcycle TVS, plate number RE 221Z, had concealed the ‘very severe drugs’ in a sack of charcoal so as to beat security.

Apparently, Nsengiyaremye had been hired by a major drug dealer to pick the illegal luggage from Mukamira in Nyabihu District and deliver it to him in Ngororero District.
The charcoal trick, however, hit a dead end upon information provided by a suspicious local resident.

“Police has since established that Nsengiyaremye left Kamonyi District at about 4am on Monday, to pick the narcotics in Mukamira, Nyabihu District. He was hired by a suspected major drug dealer identified as Jean de Dieu Uwamungu and they were supposed to link up in Ngororero District,” Chief Inspector of Police (CIP) Bonaventure Twizere Karekezi, the Police spokesperson of the Western region said.

In Mukamira, Nsengiyaremye met a cyclist identified as Jean Claude Gapanda, who brought the sack of charcoal in which the narcotics were concealed. However, on the way to Ngororero with the illegal luggage, he encountered a Police checkpoint.

“Nsengiyaremye hired a cyclist after seeing Police officers, to transport the sack across the checkpoint along Mukamira-Kabaya road, and they linked up across the checkpoint.

However, there was a resident, who witnessed all that transpired between Nsengiyaremye and the cyclist. This prompted the suspicious resident to walk straight to Police officers at the checkpoint and report the incident,” CIP Karekezi explained.

Police officers in Mukamira, he added, immediately contacted their counterparts in Jomba Sector.

“A roadblock was mounted in Rugera Village of Nyamitanzi Cell in Jomba where Nsengiyaremye was intercepted at about 5:30am. The officers searched the sack he was transporting only to find two bundles containing about 10,000 rolls of cannabis, covered with charcoal. Nsengiyaremye was immediately taken into custody and the motorcycle impounded at Jomba Police station, where he was handed over to Rwanda Investigation Bureau,” said the spokesperson.

In the phone communication between Uwamungu and Nsengiyaremye, the former had sent the latter Rwf 50,000 on Mobile Money.

In turn, Nsengiyaremye also wired Rwf 30,000 from his phone to another phone registered in the names of Jean Claude Gapanda, who allegedly brought to him the charcoal sack in which the narcotics were concealed.

CIP Karekezi thanked the resident, who raised the suspicion and facilitated the arrest of the motorcyclist.

“Whenever you suspect any foul play, call the Police or any other relevant institution to authenticate your suspicions; that’s what community policing and neighborhood watch is all about,” the spokesperson said.

Law enforcement agencies, he said, are working together to bring to justice all those connected to this criminal act.

The Ministerial Order No. 001/MoH/2019 of 04/03/2019 establishing the list of narcotic drugs and their categorisation, classifies cannabis as a “very severe drug.”
The law determining offences and penalties in general in Rwanda, especially in its article 263, provides an imprisonment of between 20 years and life, for anyone convicted for very severe narcotic drugs and a fine of up to Rwf30 million.

They discussed the country’s economic and investment plans as announced by Presidency Office via twitter account.

Yamusah Group is a company that has been in the hospitality business for close to two decades. It has invested in Hotels like Best Western Premier, Airside Hotels, Protea Hotel by Marriott among other construction projects. It is also involved in trading activities through Zara Trade, Zara Kitchen, Zara Security, Zara Forex and Zara Travel & Tour.

Adjaye Associates is an award winning architectural and design firm with studios in Accra, London and New York, led by Sir David Adjaye. He has been awarded the Royal Institute of British Architects’ Royal Gold Medal 2021, becoming the first black architect to win the prize.

Awarded by RIBA and personally approved by the Queen, the Royal Gold Medal recognises those who have dedicated their lives to the “advancement of architecture”

Sir David Frank Adjaye born September 22, 1966 is a Ghanaian-British architect. He is known for designing many notable buildings around the world, including the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, DC, and the Skolkovo Moscow School of Management.

Adjaye was born in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The son of a Ghanaian diplomat, he lived in Tanzania, Egypt, Yemen and Lebanon before moving to Britain at the age of nine. Upon graduating with a BA in Architecture from London South Bank University in 1990, he was nominated for the RIBA President’s Medals, and won the RIBA Bronze Medal for the best design project produced at BA level worldwide. He graduated with an MA in 1993 from the Royal College of Art.

Recent works include The Webster in Los Angeles, California (2020), Mole House in London, UK (2019), Ruby City in San Antonio, Texas (2019), McCarter Switching Station in Newark, New Jersey (2018), Sugar Hill Mixed-Use Development in Harlem, New York (2015), Alara Concept Store in Lagos, Nigeria (2015), Aïshti Foundation in Beirut, Lebanon (2015).

In 2015, he was commissioned to design a new home for the Studio Museum in Harlem.

In March 2018, Adjaye Associates’ designs for the National Cathedral of Ghana were unveiled by Ghanaian president Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.

In September 2020, David Adjaye unveiled his designs for the Princeton University Art Museum.

The statement from the Ministry of Health released last night shows that the new cases were found in Kigali (1) Muhanga (10) from Muhanga prison, Rubavu (4), Nyanza (2), Musanze (2), Rusizi (2), Bugesera (2) and Nyagatare (1).

The Ministry of Health confirmed the first case on 14th March 2020.

Since the COVID-19 outbreak in Rwanda, 5750 cases have been found out of 611 684 sample tests. 5241 of them have recovered, 462 are active cases while 47 have succumbed to the pandemic.

Coronavirus symptoms include coughing, flu, and difficulty in breathing. The virus is said to be transmitted through the mucous membranes of the respiratory tract.

Rwandans are required to continue to comply with government regulations, especially with frequent washing of hands and water and soap, wearing masks when leaving home or in public.

The project dubbed ‘Scent Identification of COVID-19 using dogs’ has proved successful in developed countries including Germany. It will be helpful for the country to test a large number of people during this period when many businesses are reopening.

The agreements were signed on Monday witnessed by the Director General of Rwanda Biomedical Centre RBC, Dr Sabin Nsanzimana and Germany amabassador, Dr Thomas Kurz.

The project is expected to be effected next month.

“Such a pleasure to sign today with the Director General of Rwanda Biomedical Centre RBC, Dr Sabin Nsanzimana the project partnership ‘Scent Identification of COVID-19 using dogs’. Dogs in Germany proved capable of identifying people infected with COVID-19, the same will apply for Rwandan dogs soon,” tweeted Germany embassy in Rwanda following the ceremony.

Sniffer dogs are dogs that are trained to use their senses to detect substances such as explosives, illegal drugs, wildlife scat, currency, blood, and contraband electronics. The sense most used by sniffer dogs is smell. The smell from the detection dogs are more enhanced than the average dog. They are trained to have this great sense of smell.

Sniffer dogs that normally look for explosives or drugs have been used previously to smell various cancers and hypoglycemia in diabetics. This medical application motivated veterinary scientists to research the potential ability of sniffer dogs to detect the coronavirus. 

In July 2020, Researchers in Germany found that army sniffer dogs can discern between samples from coronavirus-infected and healthy patients.

Scientists at the University of Veterinary Medicine Hanover found that trained sniffer dogs could be used to detect COVID-19 in human samples with a relatively high rate of accuracy.

Eight sniffer dogs from the German Bundeswehr were trained for only a weekto distinguish between the mucus and saliva of patients infected with coronavirus and non-infected individuals.

The dogs were then presented with positive and negative samples on a random basis by a machine.

The animals were able to positively detect SARS-CoV-2 infected secretions with an 83% success rate, and control secretions at a rate of 96%. The overall detection rate, combining both, was 94%.

In its conclusion based on more than 1,000 sniffed samples, published in the BMC Infectious Diseases journal, the team said dogs could play a role in detecting infected individuals.

The method has been applied in many countries and proved that dogs can identify COVID-19 patients at low cost.

It is expected to boost Rwanda’s capacity to test COVID-19 and complements ongoing efforts to contain effects of the pandemic.

In a bid to minimise contact between patients infected with the coronavirus and doctors and nurses in hospitals, the country has deployed three robots to carry out simple tasks like taking temperatures and monitoring patients.

Rwanda has so far conducted 609 367 COVID-19 tests of which 5726 were positive. A As of today, the country recorded has 482 active cases and 47 deaths.

The MoU for the scholarship worth US$ 45.000 (Rwf 45 million) was signed on 20th November 2020 and expected to award US$300 to each student in a boarding school, for the academic year of 2020-2021.

The Edified Scholarships was initiated in 2002 to financially support brilliant secondary school students from economically vulnerable backgrounds, in their pursuit of education.

Today, the programme sponsors 694 students in 102 secondary schools countrywide.
During holidays, these students are brought together to impart them with essential life skills commenting school education.

IHS has provided 400 scholarships under this partnership with Imbuto Foundation since 2015.

Through the Edified Generation, a total of 9.601 students including male and females have been sponsored.

It is under this context that a meeting of stakeholders in horticulture subsector was convened in Kigali on 20th November 2020 to discuss issues and opportunities around the seed industry in Rwanda.

Participating horticulture farmers expressed concerns over hiked vegetable, fruits seed prices especially French beans and chili and appealed to the Government to introduce seed-subsidy program to facilitate their farming.

They explained that chili farmers need Rwf 700,000 or Rwf 1 million to afford seeds to plant on a hectare depending on sought variety while the price for French beans seeds to be planted on a hectare is Rwf 500,000.

Devotha Mukaserire, the representative of farmers’ groups involved in the agriculture of fruits, vegetables and flowers in Rwanda cited higher price for Hybrid seeds as one of major challenges facing farmers.

“Seeds for vegetables are very expensive. Most of them are imported leading to higher prices. That’s the most challenging issue. This pushes farmers try to evade the high cost by multiplying seeds themselves with inadequate skills that sometimes multiply seeds from sick crops resulting into the spread of crop diseases,” she said.

Mukaserire explained that chili and French beans are the most expensive even though seeds for tomatoes, carrots and green pepper and green pepper are not sold at fair price.

She appealed to the Government to intervene by producing expensive seeds locally to make them affordable at lower cost or implement subsidy measures to facilitate smallholder farmers who fail to plant these crops due to soaring price.

Emille Uwimana, a chilli farmer in Rwamagana district also reminisced on the higher and demanded for measures to subsidize vegetable seed price.

“I am required Rwf 720,000 to grow chili on a hectare and over Rwf 500,000 to grow French beans on the same land. This is additional to funds invested to hire arable land and pesticides making it a huge investment,” he said.

Uwimana said that expensive price incurs loss sometimes in case of poor market conditions.

Alex Uwizeye, Country Coordinator of AgriProFocus, an international multi-stakeholder network in the agri-food sector explained that expensive seeds matters but should be taken into business perspective.

“We consider something expensive when invested money cannot be recovered. However, it is corresponding when something expensive brings good productivity. The matter should be finding out whether everyone can afford such seeds. Not everyone can afford it but we don’t want everyone to grow chili,” he said.

Uwizeye however explained that concerned parties including AgriProFocus are seeking remedy to produce vegetable seeds locally.

Dr Assinapol Ndereyimana, a researcher at Rwanda Agriculture Board (RAB) explained that French beans and chili are particularly for business people.

“Chili is exported and seeds grown in most places are the same. It is rarely sold at low-cost. The seeds for chili are not expensive on one hand because many people are doing it for business purposes. I am against the idea of introducing subsidy program for chili growing yet it is like other businesses,” he said.

Dr Ndereyimana highlighted that other seeds are classified into different categories that farmers can chose from a wide variety matching their financial means.

He pointed out that onion seeds vary from Rwf 10,000 and Rwf 40,000 while the cost of Hybrid seed costs Rwf 150,000.

RAB is undergoing research on chili seeds so that they can be produced locally.

Jacques Tuyishime, the Managing Director of Holland Green Tech which sells agro-inputs including vegetable seeds among other agricultural equipment explained that high cost of vegetable seeds emanates from resources investing by manufacturers.

“Planting chili on a hectare might require between Rwf 700,000 and Rwf 1 million investments on seeds. However, the produce recovers the capital and generates profit. If chili seeds take 10% of the capital, it doesn’t mean expensive cost. Farmers have inadequate means sometimes requiring them to seek loans from financial institutions. It takes big investments but generates huge returns,” he observed.