Rwanda

Across Rwanda, Cordaid works with both the government and companies to give business owners access to microfinance, further develop the private sector and improve food security.

Our interventions also integrate climate change adaptation and mitigation strategies to make communities more resilient to disasters.

We work with agricultural players, including smallholder farmers, village loan and savings associations, microfinance institutions, agricultural input suppliers, and government agencies to strengthen an interconnected system that supports sustainable agricultural development.

By working together, these players can address the bottlenecks that hinder access to finance and provide farmers with an entire suite of financial and non-financial services that enable them to improve their productivity.

Watch this video about the Transforming Eastern Province through Adaptation programme:

This encourages innovation and the development of new financial products, like green financing. This funding method enables farmers to transition to nature-positive and low-emission farming practices, which will help improve the environment.

By collaborating with microfinance institutions and other players, farmers can access flexible loans designed for their specific needs, such as inputs, irrigation equipment, and fertiliser.

SOME OF OUR KEY RESULTS

3,000 saving groups supported and linked to formal banks and microfinance institutes (2024)
$260,000 in loans distributed to remote smallholders (2024)
62% of the supported farmers are women (2024)
4,400 agribusiness and farmers supported access to digital services (2024)
200,000 farmer households supported with improved access to markets, finance, and climate action (2024)

WHAT WE DO IN RWANDA

Transforming Eastern Province through Adaptation (TREPA)
Together with IUCN, Enabel, ICRAF, and World Vision, Cordaid Rwanda is implementing the TREPA project in the Eastern Province of Rwanda. This 6-year project supports 260,000 people with access to climate-resilient investments and restores 60,000 hectares of degraded landscapes.

The project will promote improved clean and efficient cooking energy technologies to more than 100,000 households. It will also develop climate-resilient markets and supply chains to incentivise investments in forests, increase the capacity of communities to renew and sustainably manage forests and agroforestry resources, and support smallholder farmers to adopt climate-resilient agriculture.

Read more: Rwandan farmers brace for climate change on their deceivingly lush lands

Kayonza Irrigation and Integrated Watershed Management Project (KIIWP2)
The goal of KIIWP is to contribute to poverty reduction in the drought-prone Eastern Province of Rwanda. We do this by improving food security and the income of rural households on a sustainable basis and by building the climate resilience of targeted groups.

We develop farming as a business, facilitate market linkages, and enhance access to finance. Cordaid and the International Fund for Agricultural Development are co-financing this five-year project.

Promoting Smallholder Agro-Export Competitiveness (PSAC)
This is a six-year project funded by the International Fund for Agriculture Development with co-financing from Cordaid, the Government of Rwanda, the Government of Spain, and Heifer International.

The project is implemented through the Ministry of Agriculture and Animal Resources and the lead implementation agency is the National Agriculture Export Board (NAEB). Cordaid offers a range of support and activities, such as capacity-building, training, and institutional strengthening for farmers, cooperatives, and financial institutions. We also link smallholder exporters to the markets.

The project operates in 14 districts and targets 56,695 households.

Building Resilience of Communities to Climate Variability in Rwanda’s Congo Nile Divide Region through Forest and Landscape Restoration
This five-year initiative is co-funded by the Green Climate Fund and the Ministry of Environment. The Rwanda Forestry Authority serves as the lead implementing agency.

Cordaid’s role in the project focuses on enhancing rural livelihoods by generating alternative income sources to reduce pressure on forests. This will be achieved through the development and scaling of agroforestry-related value chains, facilitating market access for climate-resilient products, and promoting the use of efficient cookstoves.

We also increase financial services and private sector investments by supporting the establishment of savings and loan groups and by building the capacity of financial institutions to serve the targeted value chains and communities.

The project operates in 10 districts within the Congo Nile Divide region, directly impacting an estimated 1,254,242 people.

Jya Mbere: Access to Finance and Business Development
The Socio-Economic Inclusion of Refugees and Host Communities in Rwanda Project (Jya Mbere) is a project financed by the World Bank through an agreement with the Republic of Rwanda.

The project contributes to the ongoing shift from a humanitarian to a long-term, government-led developmental response including refugees and host communities.

Cordaid is building the capacity of enterprises and cooperatives of refugees to start and grow their business projects. We also enhance the capacity of the existing network of business development advisers who are responsible for the support of local initiatives by linking them with funding from the project and other sources, as well as by providing them assistance with marketing and bookkeeping.

PRISM
The Partnership for Resilient and Inclusive Small Livestock Market (PRISM) is a project of the Ministry of Agriculture and Animal Resources implemented under the Rwanda Agriculture and Animal Resources Development Board.

The three-year partnership supports technical assistance to financial institutions and access to finance for smallholder livestock farmers.

Strengthening Agricultural Resilience through Learning and Innovation (STARLIT) (closed project)
The project, which started in January 2022, aimed to strengthen the resilience of smallholder farmers in the context of prolonged disasters, such as the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change.

STARLIT was an 18-month project that targeted 2,800 smallholder farmers in the maize value chain in Rwanda and Kenya, of which 45% are women.

To strengthen farmers’ resilience, we focus on four components: access to agricultural mechanisation, access to finance, access to digital services, and South-South knowledge exchange.

Read more: Better access to data, equipment, and loans for Rwandan farmers

Rwanda Dairy Development Project (closed project)
The overall goal of the Rwanda Dairy Development Project was to contribute to economic growth and improve the livelihoods of resource-poor rural households focusing on food security, nutrition and the empowerment of women and youth in a sustainable and climate-resilient value chain.

Cordaid has made it more attractive for savings and credit cooperatives and microfinance institutes to finance the dairy value chain. We enabled them to develop and deliver adapted financial products (savings, loans, payments) targeting small dairy farmers and small enterprises.

This was a one-year project financed by the International Fund for Agricultural Development.

Sustainable Market Alliance and Assets Creation for Resilient Communities and Gender Transformation (SMART) (closed project)
The World Food Programme and Cordaid have had an ongoing collaboration since 2016 to link financial service providers to producer organisations for finance in the value chain.

The project’s overall goal was to improve smallholder farmers’ access to inputs, markets, and equipment across 75 cooperatives, mainly run by women.

Under the same collaboration, Plusplus led a crowdfunding initiative to attract more funding for microfinance institutions.

ReGenerate Rwanda (closed project)
The goal of ReGenerate Rwanda was to sustainably increase the income of 30,000 women, youth, and men in western and southern Rwanda. Using a market systems development approach, this five-year programme aimed to identify, catalyse, and scale up systemic solutions to reduce poverty, advance gender equality, regenerate the environment, and increase resilience.

The project was funded by the International Fund for Agricultural Development and led by TechnoServe in partnership with Cordaid.

WHERE WE WORK IN RWANDA

In the western and southern provinces, we support financial institutions by developing innovative, efficient and affordable digital credit platforms to support microfinance institutions in implementing an affordable and effective loan management system.

In the eastern part of the country, Cordaid is implementing a climate adaptation programme to promote community-led strategies for building climate-resilient ecosystems.

PARTNERS AND DONORS

In Rwanda, Cordaid works with both national and international partners, including MINAGRI, RAB, MoE, NAEB, RFA, NAEB, RCCDN, RICEM, AMIR, IUCN, Enabel, World Vision, ICRAF, Microfinance institutions and banks of Rwanda, SACCOs, AMIR, Evergreen, Ignite, Hollande Greentech, Simbuka, Chomoka, VIAMO.

Our recent donors include WFP, IFAD, Mastercard Foundation, Achmea Foundation, Rabo Foundation, Green Climate Fund, Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, BRD, TechnoServe, Swedish International Development, and World Bank.