Rwanda action plan aiming to make more secondary cities green
KIGALI, Rwanda: An ambitious programme aimed at developing six green secondary cities in Rwanda is underway and is expected to help this East African country achieve sustainable economic growth through energy efficiency and green job creation.
At a time when natural resource efficiency is described as key for cities in Rwanda to move towards a green economy, the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) is supporting the government in implementing its national development plan by creating a National Roadmap for Developing Green Secondary Cities.
Six cities have been identified in this East African nation to become green: Huye (south), Muhanga (central south), Nyagatare (northeast), Rubavu (northwest), Musanze (sorth) and Rusizi (southwest).
According to GGGI, the roadmap serves mainly as an implementation tool for other national development programmes as it provides key actions and practical planning guidance to policymakers in order to strengthen economic growth, enhance the quality of health and basic services, and address vulnerability in Rwanda’s urbanisation process.
With the urban population growing at 4.5 per cent a year, more than double the global average, Rwandan officials are now emphasising the need to develop secondary cities as poles of growth as the country has set a target to achieve a 35 per cent urban population by 2034.
“The initiative has so far helped to develop a Green Investment Plan for these six cities, and a number of project concepts were then shortlisted as possible green projects,” Daniel Okechukwu Ogbonnaya, the acting country representative and lead Rwanda programme coordinator of the GGGI in Kigali, tells IPS.
By supporting the implementation of the Green City Development Projects, GGGI in collaboration with the relevant government agencies also developed a Green City Pilot vision, parameters and concepts that will enable a demonstration effect on how green urbanisation could be showcased in a flagship project.
Among some quick win projects that were identified during the development of the National Roadmap, it includes for example the Rubavu EcoTourism in northwestern Rwanda, which aims to conserve the environment while improving the welfare of local people through job creation in the tourism and travel industry.
In Rwanda, some key interventions by GGGI to support a ‘green economy’ approach to economic transformation were to move from ideas into project concepts that could be used to access investment opportunities which have a good job creation potential when implemented.
Major focuses of these interventions are mainly on sustainable land use management, promoting resilient transport systems, low carbon urban systems and green industry and private sector development.
“But the limited capacity to understand the paradigm shift at local level makes it sometimes difficult because they don’t have a proper understanding of the business environment,” Ogbonnaya says.