Behind Rwanda's economic 'miracle' rural poverty persists: UN expert

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Rwanda, one of Africa’s fastest-growing economies, needs to distribute its wealth better to lift and protect rural populations still living below the poverty line, a UN rapporteur on extreme poverty said Friday.

Rwanda’s rapid economic growth since the 1994 Tutsi genocide, which claimed around 800,000 lives, has been described as a "miracle."

However, much of that expansion is concentrated in the capital, Kigali, which alone contributes 41 percent of the country’s GDP, according to government data.

The World Bank recently observed that Rwanda, whose GDP grew by 8.9 percent in 2024, faces a major challenge of "inclusiveness of growth," noting major development tend to favour "more educated workers."

"Rwanda has made remarkable strides in reducing poverty, lifting approximately 1.5 million Rwandans out of poverty in just seven years between 2017-2024," Olivier De Schutter, the UN special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights said in a statement.

Schutter, however, said Kigali faces the challenge of reaching some 3.6 million people still living below the poverty line, most of them in rural areas.

"Poverty is very much a rural phenomenon, with 80 percent of Rwandans in poverty living in rural areas," he told AFP.

While Rwanda's poverty level has dropped from 39.8 percent in 2017 to 27.4 percent in 2024 Schutter said "the bulk of the population is still waiting to see the results of the progress."

With a population of around 14.5 million, Rwanda is increasingly shifting its economy toward services, with Kigali investing in tourism, technology and events.

But agriculture, mostly practised in the countryside, remains the cornerstone of the economy. However, Schutter says rural areas are experiencing very high rates of child malnutrition.

"This Rwandan miracle is a reality for part of the population, a largely English-speaking urban elite that has seen opportunities increase and is benefiting quite spectacularly from this progress," Schutter said.

Rwanda is set to present its 2025/2026 fiscal year budget to parliament in June.

With public debt nearing 80 percent of Rwanda’s GDP as of January 2025, the government has pledged budget cuts -- but these must not come "on the backs of the poor" by targeting education, social protection and healthcare, the UN rapporteur warned, adding that there has been a "concerning trend" of such cuts in recent years.