Rwanda coffee industry is in the know
Coffee is important to the African country of Rwanda. It is one of its major exports and the war-torn country is anxious to increase levels of productivity and working practices.
For this reason, the local news has recently reported on a new initiative to improve the production and promotion of coffee. A seminar was arranged by a Dutch organisation called SNV and worked with the National Agricultural Export Board. Who were the attendees? Various workers from local coffee washing station cooperatives attended the event. What was the subject covered by the seminar? Information technology and its use in the industry.
The name of the game was to learn basic skills in IT – these skills will help the Rwandan cooperatives improve their preparation of financial reports each month and each year, therefore avoiding some unnecessary losses which have been incurred to date. These skills will also help the coffee cooperatives to liaise with banks in order to get credit.
There are various other initiatives to help the Rwandan people too. Project Rwanda, for example, has set up a scheme to introduce bicycles for particular needs within the country by sourcing appropriate bikes from overseas suppliers at cost-effective prices. The first such batch of ‘specific need’ bikes is aimed at the coffee industry – two thousand special hauling bicycles are to be made available to coffee farmers to enable them to move their crop to the washing station more effectively. This is hoped to help to improve productivity and profits.