Australian company to invest in rice production

BY EDWIN MUSONI An Australian company, ICM Agribusiness Group has expressed interest in improving the quality of rice in the country. The company’s Executive Chairman, Doug Shears, who also met President Paul Kagame on Thursday, told reporters that the country has a huge potential to join the club of major rice-exporting nations. “Rwanda has the potential of exporting rice even overseas; what is required is standard processing only,” said Shears. The Director of Rwanda Investment and Export Promotion Agency, Francis Gatare, said Shears’ investment would increase the country’s rice production from 4.5 tonnes per hectare to about 9 tonnes per hectare. Added Gatare: “Currently Rwanda produces 4.5 tonnes per hectare and Shears’ investment would increase the production to 9 tonnes per hectare,” said Gatare. ICM Agribusiness Group, which is the largest private-owned food and fibre producers in Australia, is currently ploughing rice farms in the Eastern and Western provinces. DFID supports IT sector Meanwhile, the visiting chief scientific advisor at British Department for International Development (DFID), Sir Gordon Conway, said that his government will provide £0.7 million for the enactment of laws to govern Information and Technology sector. “Britain is determined to allocate funds in promoting Rwanda’s IT sector,” Conway told journalists shortly after meeting with President Paul Kagame at Village Urugwiro on Thursday. He said he had held talks with various Rwandan ministers on a number of issues in the sector. Conway later on Thursday delivered a public lecture on climate change and global warming at Kigali Institute of Science and Technology (KIST).

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Australian company to invest in rice production