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Development Programs In Rwanda
WASHINGTON, DC 20523
PRESS OFFICE
http://www.usaid.gov
Press: (202) 712-4320
Public Information: (202) 712-4810
2004-011
April 05, 2004
The civil war and genocide that ravaged Rwanda prior to 1994
left Rwandans with an unstable government, economy, and society.
The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has
been working with the Government of Rwanda and others for
more than a decade to help bring peace, democracy, and stability
to Rwandan citizens through a number of programs. USAID efforts
have generated successes such as:
Democracy and Governance
- USAID's Democracy and Governance Team helped the Rwandan
Ministry of Justice complete a nationwide computer network
system connecting 18 sites, including the central Ministry,
Attorney General's Office and Gacaca headquarters with provincial
prosecutor offices.
- USAID assists SERUKA, an organization which has helped
promote the role of women in both community reconciliation
and justice in post-conflict Rwanda. As a result, women
were elected to serve as judges on Gacaca, Rwanda's grassroots
war crime trials held at the village level.
- USAID provided nearly $800,000 for material support of
the Gacaca jurisdictions for computers, a case management
database, and other necessary equipment and provided ethics
training to more than 100 justice sector officials.
- Programs funded by USAID helped train 106 district accountants
to strengthen and standardize the financial accounting system
for local government.
- More than 220 police cadets and officers received professionalism
training through USAID-funded programs.
- USAID helped provide legal education for 177 Anglophone
lawyers.
- Ethnicity-free identity cards were produced and issued
with the assistance of USAID.
- In support of decentralization, USAID financed the implementation
of 87 community development projects in 30 districts.
Health
- In 2003, the United States Government established the
first two sites in the world to provide anti-retroviral
therapy to treat AIDS patients in urban and rural Rwanda.
- The Displaced Children and Orphans Fund, which USAID granted
$1.6 million, has worked to educate more than 4,000 youth
in three districts about discrimination and promotion of
acceptance of children and youth affected by or infected
with HIV.
- Voluntary counseling and testing sites for HIV/AIDS, funded
by the United States Government, served 85,000 clients in
2003.
- In 2003, the United States Government increased funding
and expanded key health services to 35 sites to prevent
mother to child HIV transmission. The expansion also improved
services in the following areas, nutritional support, maternal
health, and home-based care services.
- A National Roll-Back Malaria Strategy was adopted to include
early treatment for pregnant women.
Violence Prevention
- Through a $993,728 Victims of Torture grant to the International
Rescue Committee for a sexual and gender-based violence
program, USAID worked in conjunction with the Ministry of
Gender and Women Promotion to train 19 staff to implement
a multi-sector provincial sensitization program. By November
2002, 902 Gacaca judges, local nongovernmental organizations,
church leaders, health officials, and deputy mayors received
training on gender and violence sensitization issues. More
than 446 police officers nationwide received training under
this program.
- With USAID assistance, Rwanda conducted its first national
quantitative survey aimed to establish incidence rates of
the most common forms of gender-based violence to better
design projects in the future.
- USAID initiated regular weekly radio programs to build
awareness of gender-based violence and updates on the Gacaca
trials. Estimates show that 30 percent of women survivors
from the genocide have been reached through this programming.
- USAID helped fund seminars for national leaders and the
media about reconciliation and violence prevention
Rural Economy
- With more than 90 percent of Rwanda's population involved
in agriculture, USAID has helped to increase food supply
through dissemination of improved crop varieties and cultivation
techniques.
- USAID assisted private sector operators in increasing
their sales of passion fruit and pyrethrum.
- USAID provided technical assistance, training, and material
inputs to more than 60 rural enterprises in Rwanda.
- A USAID-funded project transformed a revolving grants
program to short-term loans with a reimbursement rate of
98 percent among selected women's groups.
- Coffee processing stations rose from three in 2000 to
ten in 2003 and production of fully processed specialty
coffee increased from 49 metric tons in 2002 to 334 metric
tons in 2003.
- USAID supported diversified agribusiness enterprises including
fisheries, chili pepper, wheat, and honey.
Education
- Through a grant for the Genocide Survivors Fund, more
than $3 million has gone to pay the school fees and related
costs for more than 7,500 secondary-school children orphaned
by the genocide.
- The Kigali Institute of Education launched four Distance
Learning Centers funded by USAID where secondary school
teachers can receive in-service training through computer-assisted
learning in order to become fully qualified to teach.
- USAID formed a public-private alliance to provide a computer
for more than half of Rwandan primary schools.
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