Technicians busy at Tolirwa factory producing construction materials
All companies and individuals dealing in ‘Made in Rwanda’products will be given a threshold – following a cabinet approval on Tuesday.
The cabinet meeting, chaired by President Paul Kagame approved a policy that will enable all bidders supplying materials and products that support Made in Rwanda to get local preference.
As part of supporting growth of Rwandan manufacturing capacity, the Finance Ministry last year summoned all chief budget officers and issued them with a document titled: “Use of public procurement to support Made in Rwanda program”.
According to the document, Government revised its procurement laws on local preference to support products Made in Rwanda.
Under the new policy that was approved Tuesday, 22 products attached to local preference include; construction materials, electricity generation and water supply equipment materials, school, and medical equipment.
The new revised law provides tender documents using standard bidding documents. For instance, under article 22 of the ministerial order establishing regulations on public procurement and standard bidding documents, responsive bids shall be categorised as ‘Bids to be granted local preference’ and ‘other bids’.
Last year, trade and industry Ministry announced government’s key implementation plans to promote locally made products.
One of the strategies include; a communication campaign and a corporate roll-out program which covered the whole of December last year.
The second category of activities under the strategy include supporting local producers through government procurement.
Government also designed a national small and medium program to upgrade the products and the quality of our SME products to bring them at a level where they can compete with the competitors from the region.
Meanwhile, a week-long ‘Made in Rwanda’ trade fair closed yesterday in the capital Kigali, with a call on Rwandans to focus on the local products.
