The government should set up a deadline when Rwanda will be financially independent and also prepare a multi-year plan to deliver the nation to a high-income economy by 2050.

The recommendation is among 12 resolutions from the 14th National Dialogue (Umushyikirano), which were announced yesterday by the Prime Minister’s office during a press conference.

The resolutions called for continued efforts to promote good governance and efficient delivery of services to citizens, while also promoting unity and reconciliation among Rwandans through programmes like civic education training (Itorero), fighting genocide ideology, and helping genocide survivors recover their destroyed property and access therapy for trauma.

They also urged the government to keep up the ‘Made in Rwanda’ campaign to bolster local production, prepare major irrigation projects in Eastern Province’s districts of Nyagatare, Gatsibo, Kayonza, and Kirehe, as well as set up a deadline when Rwanda will be able to adequately finance its national budget.

The Minister for Finance and Economic Planning, Claver Gatete, said that preparing Vision 2050 when it is envisaged that the country will be a high-income economy will require having different medium term plans such as five-year programmes.

With now Rwandans having urged the government to prepare the proposal, Gatete said, its policy-makers and technocrats will move to action.

"There is a lot of work that has to be done along the way as we prepare and implement Vision 2050,” he said at the press briefing yesterday.

Gatete said at the National Dialogue that under current initial planning towards Vision 2050, Rwanda is projected to be an upper middle income country by 2035 with a per capita annual income of more than $4000 while it will be a high income economy by 2050 when every Rwandan will be earning at least $12000 a year with a relatively high standard of living.

With the country’s annual per capita income hovering around $720 today, Gatete said that the country’s economy will need to be at an average annual growth of above 10 per cent, doubling its current growth rate, if Vision 2050 is to be achieved.

As for Rwandans to adequately finance their national budget, Gatete said the target means moving from the current 18.7 per cent rate of reliance on financial donations for the budget to less than 10 per cent.

That will require efficient collection of taxes, prudent management of public funds, and working hard to increase the amount and quality of goods and services produced in Rwanda, he noted.

"Between 5 and 10 per cent aid for the national budget is what is normal in financially independent countries. At that rate, if the aid stopped there wouldn’t be a crisis,” Minister Gatete noted.

The resolutions from the 14th National Dialogue have also tipped officials on the need to uphold accountability in the use of public finances and efficient coordination across different levels of government to improve service delivery.

The minister for cabinet affairs, Stella Ford Mugabo, told journalists at the briefing that officials will move immediately to implement all the resolutions from the National Dialogue.

"The institutions in charge will move to the planning process in order to implement the resolutions,” she said.

The dialogue, which run for two days from Thursday to Friday last week, was held under the theme of "Shaping Together the Rwanda We Want” to emphasise the collaboration between leaders and citizens as a pillar for continued development.

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