Rwanda Development Board was on Monday night feted as one of the eastern Africa’s best investment promotion agencies at an annual investment meeting conference in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
The Annual Investment Meeting is a Foreign Direct Investment summit bringing together investors, multinationals, financiers and governments from across the world.
The meeting, among others, showcases up-to-date information, strategies and knowledge on attracting Foreign Direct Investment (FDI).
Rwanda emerged as the second best investment promotion agency in eastern African region after Ethiopia.
RDB, the country’s investment promotion agency, has rolled out a number of initiatives to engage investors, including a weekly investors’ clinic where they address issues affecting individual firms.
The agency’s chief operations officer, Emmanuel Hategeka, who picked up the award on behalf of Rwanda during the event in Dubai, said that Rwanda was nominated for the award by Africa Improved Foods, a Dutch firm with a presence in Rwanda.
"The AIM2018 Investment Award is given to a country based on feedback from a major investor already operating in the country as a result of their experience doing business in that country. In the case of Rwanda, the major investor that nominated (us) was AIF (Africa Improved Foods). This award is further evidence of Rwanda’s pro-business focus,” he said.
Speaking to The New Times from Dubai, Hategeka said the award is a good incentive for RDB to scale up ‘aftercare’ services and do even better in improving investment ecosystem.
Rwanda is ranked second in Africa in the latest World Bank Doing Business and 41th globally.
The country improved 15 places globally after implementing five key reforms in one year.
Plans to roll out 15 new reforms across various sectors are at an advanced stage which could see Rwanda improve further in the next World Bank Doing Business report.
The new raft of reforms will cover tax payment, electricity access, construction permits and property registration.
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