Infrastructure development is one of the six pillars of Rwanda’s Vision 2020. The rehabilitation and development of infrastructure is a crucial aspect in lowering the costs of doing business in Rwanda, which will attract domestic and foreign investment.

In fact, Rwanda has registered consistently high growth rates of above 7 per cent over the past 10 years and our medium term Development Strategy (2013-2018) targets an average growth rate of 11.5 per cent geared towards achieving middle income status by 2020.

The need for safe, reliable and cost effective energy to achieve the above envisaged levels of national growth cannot be overemphasised.

Rwanda currently ranks 1st in the ease of Doing Business in East Africa and overall 3rd in Africa and 46th in the world (out of 186 countries) as per the 2015 World Bank’s Doing Business report.

In the same context, the Government, through Rwanda Development Board, has embarked on a deliberate process to streamline power sector investment processes and procedures intended to attract private sector investments into the sector.

Our Energy Sector Strategic Plan (2013-2018) projects electricity demand of 563MW to be generated from a sustainable generation mix of hydro, methane, geothermal, peat to power and solar to eventually phase out thermal power within two years.

The Government of Rwanda is committed to achieving additional 408MW compared to current installed capacity of 155MW.

Rwanda presents a host of energy investment opportunities in the energy sector.

These projects include, among others, regional and domestic projects mainly 80MW Rusumo Hydro Electric Project, 147MW Rusuzi III Hydro Project, 200MW methane gas concession from Lake Kivu, potential geothermal prospects, Nyabarongo II project and other domestic micro hydro power plants estimated to generate 150MW installed capacity and various high voltage transmission lines to evacuate generated electric power for stable and reliable power supply to industries, factories and other productive uses.

With ongoing interconnection projects, we also envisage to import/export cheaper power from the East African Power Pool member states to strengthen bilateral power trade. Our goal is to increase electricity access to households from current 22 per cent to 70 per cent of population connected by 2017/2018.

Achieving our medium term energy generation and access targets highlighted above is estimated to cost $3 billion of investment capital over the next four years. An estimated $1.3 billion of this investment capital (43 per cent) is expected to come from private sector investments.

This week’s iPAD Rwanda Power and Infrastructure Investment Forum offers a perfect platform for participating private companies and financiers to appreciate Rwanda’s energy investment potentials and to make concrete investment decisions.

On our part as the Government of Rwanda, it is an opportunity to build sustainable business relationships with participating companies interested in investing in and/or financing projects in Rwanda’s energy sector.

Let me quote my President, "Government shouldn’t compete with the private sector and private sector doesn’t compete with the government – they are partners; they need to work together.”

We need to work together by showing those benefits that accrue through the private sector through the activities within the population. But we also, on the side of government, need to be sensitive to some of the bottlenecks that are there that we can help get out of the way to allow businesses to thrive.

We, therefore, look forward to working with you as we strive to sustainably meet our energy needs to propel the country to middle income status as envisaged by our Vision 2020.

In line with the above, therefore, we are more committed than ever, to continuously improve Rwanda’s doing business environment and to attract mutually beneficial private investments in our energy sector and beyond.

This article was extracted from the speech by the Minister for Infrastructure, James Musoni, at the opening of the iPAD Rwanda Power and Infrastructure Investment Forum in Kigali yesterday.