Fish farmers are hopeful of accessing finance from banks after the government decided to add fish farming to agriculture insurance scheme.

Mathilde Mukasekuru, the Acting Director General in charge of livestock at the Ministry of Agriculture and Animal Resources told The New Times that fish farmers will start to benefit from the agriculture insurance scheme in February.

"Contracts are being prepared and by the end of February fish farmers will start to benefit from the insurance scheme,” she said.

Rwanda launched the National Agriculture Insurance Scheme in April 2019, a move that was considered by stakeholders as a milestone for the country’s agriculture sector as it aims to cushion farmers against losses stemming from disasters.

The scheme, which is subsidised at 40 per cent by the Government, is also intended to enable farmers to easily access funding from financial institutions and ensure the flow of credit to the agricultural sector.

Fish farmers have welcomed the move to add fish farming to this scheme saying it will de-risk the sector.

Themistocles Munyangeyo, who owns Fine Fine Ltd, the firm that lost over 109 tonnes of fish from the incident that occurred in Lake Muhazi in July, 2021 told The New Times that he could double production after fish farming is de-risked.

"I was producing 720 tonnes of Tilapia fish per year or 60 tonnes per month and the production could double as the government moves to de-risk the industry.

The Insurance scheme, which we have been pushing, is a timely solution that was needed by fish farmers,” he said.

The investor, who incurred fish loss worth over Rwf200 million, said he tried to invest in fingerlings to recover.

"Fortunately government gave me a market to supply fingerlings to other fish farmers which helped me to recover. Indeed, having no insurance scheme for fish farming was discouraging new investors in this industry. It is not easy to invest Rwf20 million in fishing farming when there is no insurance,” he said.

He said that due to lack of insurance for the fish industry, financial institutions were reluctant to provide loans.

Rwanda targets to double agriculture sector lending from the current 5.2 per cent of the total share of loans from financial institutions to 10.4 per cent by 2024.

"We are hopeful that banks will now give money to fish farmers in order to increase fish production. There is also a problem with the Business Development Fund (BDF) that does not support fish farmers. It only looks at dairy, poultry and pig farmers. Government should look at this issue,” he said.

He said once fish production increases, the price will also be affordable to consumers.

Rwanda’s per capita fish consumption is presently at 2.3 kilograms per person per year.

He said there should be measures to curb fish imports as fish production increases locally.

"Fish imports from neighboring countries are hurting the local industry yet local production has increased over the past three years. Fish feeds are still expensive and therefore the price is still high while that of imported fish is low. Therefore, I am going to set up a fish feed factory,” he said.

Fish production in Rwanda slightly increased from 41,664 tonnes in 2021 to 43,560 tonnes in 2022, according to a report by the Ministry of Agriculture and Animal Resources.

It shows that 4,000 tonnes of fish was produced from fish farming.

Fishing activities are carried out in 17 lakes and four rivers in 15 districts.

Aquaculture production is done in three production systems such as earthen ponds on 324 hectares, floating cages comprising 59,390 cubic meters, and 41 dams with a total capacity of 31,360,000 cubic meters.

The main species are Limnothrissa miodon, known as Isambaza, Haplochromis sp, Nile Tilapia, Catfish, Protopterus aethiopicus, and Sprinus carpio.

Producing 112,000 tonnes of fish every year by 2024 could help Rwanda attain the average sub-Sahara per capita consumption of 6.6 kilograms per person per annum, and 265,600 metric tons to reach the global average of 16.6 kilos.

According to Josiane Niyigena, the owner of PRIUS Fish shop located in Kabuga, increasing fish production could also help lower prices.

"If the prices per kilogramme of fish decreases to below that of meat, consumption could also increase. This should go along with teaching Rwandans on the health benefits of fish and how they can prepare it,” she said.

The current retail prices are between Rwf4,300 and Rwf5,000 depending on the areas, she said.

She said more investors should join the fishing industry and those in existence need support to increase production.