The multi-million plant has nutrition programmes with the government for impoverished communities.
Africa Improved Foods (AIF), a company producing nutritious products, unveiled its Rwf50 billion ($60 million) plant at the Kigali Special Economic Zone.
AIF Rwanda is a joint venture between the government and a consortium of four international partners namely: Royal DSM, Dutch development bank-FMO, CDC Group (the UK government’s Development Finance Institution) and the International Finance Corporation.
Malnutrition remains a major public health concern in Rwanda after a recent demographic and health survey showed that chronic malnutrition affects 38 per cent of children under the age of five — resulting in stunting.
In an effort to address this concern, AIF Rwanda through its state-of-the-art facility is now producing highly nutritious porridge flours (with added milk, vitamins and minerals), which target vulnerable population segments such as pregnant and breast-feeding mothers, older infants and young children, especially in the first 1,000 days of their lives.
Besides its commercial brand “Nootri”, the multi-million plant, which has been operational since November 2016, also has nutrition programmes with the government and produces Shisha Kibondo for the most impoverished communities.
AIF also works with the World Food Programme to produce relief foods, which are distributed as far as Somalia and South Sudan.
The Plant has an annual production capacity of 45,000 tonnes, making it one of the largest nutrition factory sites in East Africa.
“Our progress has been made possible by the favourable business environment in Rwanda and strong support from the government,” said AIF Rwanda CEO Amar Ali, adding, “We will continue to deliver on our goal of producing high quality, locally-sourced, affordable nutritious products for Rwandans and East Africans.”
AIF already works with over 9,000 large and small-scale grain and cereal farmers and is keen on capitalising on growth opportunities in the fast-growing demand for nutritious foods for the domestic market and exports especially to Uganda and the Democractic Republic of Congo.