Samuel Hakizimana, a fish farmer on Lake Rweru in Bugesera District, recounts that in a single day, he supplied fish to Kigali and encountered a loss worth Rwf840,000 because of nearly impassable roads that delayed the delivery to the capital, and in the process, the fish went bad. That was about two years ago before the construction of the 12-kilomentre road connecting Lake Rweru and the main (tarmac) road linking Kigali and Bugesera District. Hakizimana is the president of fish farmers grouped in COPERWE – a cooperative of fish farmers at the Lake. “Before the road was fixed, such losses were something we were used to; fish went bad before getting to the market,” Hakizimana told The New Times on Wednesday during the launch of Nzangwa-Nyiragiseke-Mugina-Gasenyi feeder road which connects two villages in Rweru Sector. Feeder roads are intended to facilitate farmers to access market for their agriculture produces. The cooperative, made up of 106 members, keeps fish of various species including tangra and tilapia, and catches between three and four tonnes of fish per month. They sell a kilogramme at between Rwf800 and Rwf1,500. They now use about two hours to reach Kigali, where it took about five hours to make the same distance, previously. On Wednesday 30 May 2018, the Head of Delegation of the European Union, Nicola Bellomo together with Flugence Nsengiyumva, the State Minister for Agriculture launched the new feeder road. Bellomo said that about 800 kilometres of roads were rehabilitated under the support of the EU in line with supporting the feeder roads programme initiated by the Government of Rwanda in 2012. Under the programme, EU supported seven districts (Bugesera, Ngoma, Huye, Muhanga, Ngororero, Rubavu and Rulindo) through a financing agreement worth €40,000,000 (about Rwf40 billion). I hope you will make good use of this road to improve livelihoods, the envoy told Bugesera residents, adding that aside from helping to get farmers’ yields to the market, the project also provided skills to local engineers on road rehabilitation using modern equipment, and provided jobs to some Rwandans. Speaking during the event, Minister Nsengiyumva said that the objective of the feeder roads project is to ensure farm produce is easily availed to the market for farmers to get enough revenues from their trade. “The government will continue to look for support from its own coffers (at national level), or from development partners so that the activity reaches all the people/farmers,” Nsengiyumva said. Funding needed According to the National Feeder Roads Policy and Strategy developed in April 2017, a significant proportion of Rwanda rural population, whose livelihoods depend on agriculture, lacks access to rural infrastructure which hampers national development. The planned feeder roads network in the context of bringing a road that is passable by motor vehicles to within 2 km of farms in Rwanda covers about 30,000 km of including national roads. The objective is to make all the impassable roads passable by 2027. By 2015 only 13,350 km were in a good or passable condition, but that in 2027 all 30,000 km of roads will be passable and an important part will have been improved and maintained, according to government projections. editorial@newtimes.co.rw
