The government has called on farmers in Eastern Province to make the most of the opportunities availed to them as it seeks to reverse the trend of poor service delivery in the agriculture sector.
According to the Rwanda Governance Board’s (RGB) 2018 Citizens Report Card, only 49.52 per cent of the farmers were satisfied with the services they received in farming. Farmers’ satisfaction of the services they received in livestock farming was at 59.52 per cent.
The statistics were revealed on Saturday in Nyagatare at the launch of a campaign called "Governance we want,” which aims to promote citizen-centred governance
The campaign is being carried out by Rwanda Governance Board.
The event was preceded by Umuganda where livestock farmers were tipped on best farming practices like fencing pastures, bush clearing, and establishing paddocks, among others, to increase milk production.
"What we want from our citizens is to understand that the leaders are always there to facilitate their development,” said Fred Mufulukye, the Governor of Eastern Province.
He said the sector was mostly being challenged by climate change, which brings prolonged droughts.
It is such challenges that the governor says were affecting farmers’ service satisfaction. He said that the Government was working on addressing the challenges through setting up irrigation schemes and agro-processing plants.
Dr Usta Kayitesi, the acting chief executive of RGB, said that: "When we evaluate, we find that citizens do not appreciate services in agriculture yet agriculture has a great role in our country’s development.”
Today, she added, was an opportunity to show residents the various services created for them, and how best they can use them to make progress.
Esperance Muzarirehe, a livestock farmer from Kiyombe Sector, Nyagatare District, said that "We are not doing livestock farming the way we used to, we are making progress, milk production is increasing,” said
Livestock farming used to be traditional, but Muzarirehe said it is becoming more productive now as they have started to implement modern farming practices.
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