The Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Christine Lagarde, has said visiting Rwanda helped inform her outlook of the country’s economy and pledged to closely work with the government to sustain the growth pace and achieve middle income status.

In a statement she issued at the end of her three day visit to Rwanda, Lagarde said: "My visit to Rwanda—one of Africa’s economic success stories—has been extremely fruitful and informative. I am grateful for the warm welcome I received and for the time that was given to my visit.”

She said Rwanda’s economic achievements are based on real GDP growth that has averaged 8 per cent a year over the past decade, subdued inflation, and foreign reserves maintained at adequate levels.

"This has enabled an impressive performance in reducing poverty, which had declined to below 45 per cent in 2010-11 from 57 per cent in 2005-06,” the IMF chief said.

Lagarde also commended the government’s sustained efforts to improve public financial management, good governance, and reform the business environment—placing Rwanda among the top African economies in the World Bank’s Doing Business Indicators.

However, she said, Rwanda’s challenge moving forward is "how to sustain this strong economic performance while making the transition toward a more self-reliant, private sector-led, and export-oriented economy,” which government envisages by 2020.

She said while aid flows to Rwanda have declined by about 5 per cent of GDP since 2000, and the country is making laudable efforts to mobilise its own domestic resources, these are still low by regional standards.

No change in strategy

Finance and Economic Pllanning minister Claver Gatete said Rwanda’s growth path is well-charted under the country’s Economic Development and Poverty Reduction Strategy (EDPRS) programmes.

"We appreciate Lagarde’s observations, which I am glad to note, are already captured in our EDPRS programmes that entail key thematic areas needed to drive the country’s growth,” Amb. Gatete said.

The minister said government is committed to continue implementing EDPRSII, whose main objective is to devise Rwanda’s medium-term strategy in order to put the country on a higher growth trajectory to ensure that the country achieves middle-income status by 2020.

The government also expects the private sector to take the driving seat in economic growth to boost poverty reduction efforts.

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