Dairy farmers in Rwanda will benefit from increased income following the allocation of funding to go towards capacity building of 21 milk centres in the country.
The capacity building of the milk centres will improve supply and demand to support the growing production of milk and other dairy products in the country.
The funds will be put towards training Milk Collection Centre (MCC) managers and amongst other areas to facilitate efficiency in the centres and increase the marketability of the country’s milk products.
The technical assistance will include recruitment of staff, training of MCCs managers and personel in different areas and designing as well as setting up management systems that include internal rules and regulations,” said Desire Rumanyika, head of RDB Advisory services.
Despite the growing milk production in the country, from 50 000 tons of milk in 2000 to 350 000 tons by 2009, there are only 40 milk centres in the country.
Dairy farming has become an important sector in Rwanda following the ‘one cow per poor family programme’ introduced in 2006 by President Paul Kagame.
The programme which entailed giving a cow to a poor family to increase milk production initially targeted 257, 000 households and has so far benefitted 89, 000 farmers. To date the cattle population is estimated to be over 800,000 having risen from 162,000 in 1994.
However, the increased cattle population and milk production has created the need for better collection, management and improved capacity handling by staff at milk centres. The injection of funds for capacity building is aimed at eliminating these problems.
Photo by Martapics
