Rwanda Tea Packers will soon sell its products in Congo Brazzaville, West Africa and Sudan.

Its brand, Rwanda Tea will first be on display at the forthcoming trade exhibition in Congo’s capital, Brazzaville.

The expo is organised by the Private Sector Federation to establish contacts, study the market and identify possible opportunities.

Speaking to The New Times, the firm’s board chairman, Antoine Butera, said that they have been exporting tea to Asia and Europe but are now embarking on non traditional markets. "We shall remain put as far as value addition is concerned.

We intend to penetrate different markets to promote our tea. We are looking for markets everywhere other than selling bulk teas, to bring in profits for the tea industry,” Butera said.

He, however, noted that tea consumption in Rwanda is at one percent, which is extremely low, adding that they intend to promote this within the country as well.

Butera also mentioned that their Dubai branch which has been operational for a year, closed last month because of failure to penetrate the packaged tea markets.

"The global market for tea is complex and there is the issue of oligopoly in Dubai such that a new brand would find it hard to compete.

One would have to invest heavily and picking up would take  five years,” explained Butera.

He expessed optimism, revealing that they are similarly eying South and West African markets.

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