NAEB is a public commercial institution created in 2011 by merging Rwanda’s coffee, tea, and horticulture development authorities, to combine efforts and resources to increase agricultural exports. The National Agricultural Export Board (NAEB’s) is established as a public commercial institution through Law № 13/2017, under the tutelage of the Ministry of Agriculture and Animal resources with the Board of Directors undertaking strategic oversight and fiduciary responsibility. The NAEB has the mandate to drive the country’s agri-exports revenues growth through supporting the exports sector actors across production, value addition, marketing and policy interventions. It has played a vital role in expanding Rwanda agricultural exports quality and revenue, contributing to Rwanda’s development. The strategic objectives of the Plan include to; support an increase in productivity and quality of prioritized agri-export value chains- this will result in reduced post-harvest losses, continuous supply of Rwanda agri-export to the market and increased demand for our products and hence gain trust from buyers of respective products ; support increased value addition and market penetration of Rwanda agri-exports- this will lead to increased contribution of agri-exports to the country’s balance of payments and good visibility of prioritized Rwanda agri-export brands on international markets; and enhance sector coordination and the enabling environment for sustainable growth of agri-exports- this will lead to effective personnel and institutional coordination mechanisms in production, value addition and marketing services to grow the prioritized agri-exports. The Plan identifies six main programming areas including, productivity and quality management, global operator attraction, business incubation, logistics and infrastructure coordination, market linkage, and branding. The Plan tasks NAEB to use a market-led approach to transform and grow Rwanda’s producers from supply-driven exporters to market-led and knowledge-intensive exporters. This it does through strengthening its marketing capacity, adopting initiatives that will attract both international and domestic investors in agri-export emerging opportunities, increase production, and support agri-export stakeholders to enhance productivity and meet international markets food safety requirements, conduct business incubation to increase the size of private sector in emerging sectors, etc. A national level coordination by NAEB of technical partners and sector platforms is required for the implementation of the Plan. This involves associating with partners in and outside of government to lead, co-lead or support execution of specific programs. It is projected that the implementation of the Plan over the course of five years will portend far-reaching economic and social impact on Rwanda, including catalyzing private sector investments worth 1 billion USD, creating over 3131, 000 jobs and supporting 525, 000 farmers.
Rwanda · 2019-05-01