Rwanda has one of the highest population densities in Africa due to high and increasing population within small area with a density of over 460 Inhabitants per square kilometer While the urbanization rate of 18.4% is among the lowest in the world, the annual urban growth rate of 4.5% is well above the world’s average of 1.8%. The implication is that “environmental issues, pressures and impacts of urban growth will require large amount of investments in basic infrastructure such as housing, energy, water, sanitation, waste management, roads” and transport to meet the targets of becoming a middle income country in 2035. 

The Government of Rwanda has set a goal in its National Strategy for Transformation (NST1) to accelerate sustainable urbanization from 18.4% (2016/17) to 35% by 2024. GGGI in the last 5 years has supported the development of a Climate Resilient Green Cities program in Rwanda with results both at the national and sub-national level. 

This project consolidates all the outputs on GGGI Rwanda’s work on green urbanization to ensure a coherent and impactful support to the government as they start implementation of the National Strategy for Transformation (NST1), and to align with the last part of Rwanda CPF (2016-2020) and the GGGI strategy (2015-2020). 

The project objective is to continue the support on Inclusive Green Urban Development to consolidate the gains of the 2017-2018 WPB where green growth principles were mainstreamed into Rwanda’s strategic plans. This project is aligned with IO1. Strengthened national, sub-national and local green growth planning, financing and institutional frameworks and IO3. Improved multi-directional knowledge sharing and learning to empower local and external agents necessary to drive green growth processes in partner governments. 

Impact: Cities in Rwanda are developed as competitive economic centers pursuing climate resilient, low carbon and inclusive growth. 

Outcome: N/A 

Project Outputs completed in 2019: 

i. Green Growth Policies:N/A

Total of 3 policy assignments:  

• Concept on Center of Excellence for Green Urbanization approved by the Permanent Secretaries from MoE, MININFRA, and Ministry of ICT with a decision to merge the planned center with the Smart Cities Lab proposed by UN-Habitat. 
• Waste to Resource Assessment Report for Huye and Muhanga currently informing policy implementation on waste management in Huye. 
• Report on Mapping Green Open Public Spaces in Rwanda’s Six Secondary Cities informed the design and implementation of public spaces in Rwanda within the urbanization sector action plans. 

Total of 4 policies adopted: 

• The CoK revised master plan 2019 is the review of the existing master plan 2013 to factor in feedback from the public on the implementation in the past 5 years as well as to integrate with the government’s revised vision 2050 and medium term strategies under the National Strategy for Transformation (NST1) 2017-2024. Moreover, the revised master plan used a more robust citizen stakeholder engagement approach as well as proposing flexibility in land utilization strategies which were trends that were not in the previous master plan. 
• 3 policies adopted: The 3 Secondary Cities revised master plan took into consideration the countries visioning and the NST1 with the DDS at the center of prioritizing the well–being of the citizens through balance urban development within the city nodes. Green growth is at the center of the revised secondary cities master plans as the recommendations from the National Roadmap for Green Secondary Cities Development (MININFRA-GGGI 2015) were put into use.

ii. Green Investments: 

• Bankable Project: Developed a detailed design for a green open public space in Nyagatare Secondary city. 

Total of 4 advisory outputs that aim to create enabling environment: 

• Concept on Center of Excellence for Green Urbanization approved by the Permanent Secretaries from MoE, MININFRA, and Ministry of ICT with a decision to merge the planned center with the Smart Cities Lab project.  
• Waste to Resource Assessment Report for Huye and Muhanga currently informing policy implementation on waste management in Huye. 
• Report on Mapping Green Open Public Spaces in Rwanda’s Six Secondary Cities currently informing the design and implementation of public spaces in Rwanda within the urbanization sector action plans. 
• The National Urban Forum Report Recommendation are presented for integration into the Urbanization and other related sector 2020-2021 annual sector strategic plans. 

Green investment catalyzed:  

• USD 250K will be drawn from the District budget with support from  national agencies to build the initial phase of the green open public space 

iii. Capacity Building and Knowledge Products: 

• Total of 15 capacity development activities delivered in areas of Green City Governance, Waste to Resource management, Infrastructure Gender Mainstreaming strategy and Knowledge management.  
• 1 knowledge product produced: “Mapping of Public Spaces to Inform Master Plan Review for Secondary Cities in Rwanda” which is guiding green infrastructure development in Rwanda and have received some international recognition due to its participatory approach. 

Project Manager: Okechukwu Daniel Ogbonnaya 

Number of staff provided: Andrew Kabera, Diane Umukunzi Uyambaje, Ilija Gubic, Jean Pierre Munyeshyaka, Pamela Birungi, Richard Ndicunguye