Agriculture in Rwanda

Lessons

Senior 4 · Geography

Agriculture in Rwanda

5 lessons

Lesson 2 of 5

Plantation Farming: Tea and Sugar Cane Case Studies

25 min

Nineteen factories on the high, wet hills

NAEB lists 19 operating tea factories in Rwanda. Figure 2 maps them, together with the country's sugar-cane estate.

Figure 2. Tea factories and the Kabuye sugar estate. Drawn by Ganzaa: factory list from NAEB; positions from OpenStreetMap (four placed at the centre of their sector; Muganza-Kivu not located); parks from OpenStreetMap.

Describe the pattern. Why are almost all the tea factories in the west and south-west, many beside Nyungwe and Gishwati? Why is the sugar estate in a valley near Kigali?

Definition

Plantation (estate) farming: large-scale growing of one cash crop, often for export, with a processing factory, hired labour, capital and management. Cash crop: a crop grown for sale.

Industrial bloc (IB): the plantation owned by a tea factory. Outgrowers: smallholders who grow the same crop on their own land and sell it to the factory.

Plantation crops in Rwanda

Tea: factory estates (industrial blocs) plus smallholder outgrowers in the Northern, Western and Southern provinces.
Sugar cane: the Kabuye estate in the Nyabarongo and Nyabugogo valleys, with outgrowers.
Pyrethrum: an industrial crop, used to make natural insecticide, grown in the cool volcanic highlands of the north-west.
Coffee is an export crop but is grown mainly by about 400,000 smallholder families rather than on plantations (NAEB).

Case study 1: tea

Aspect	Facts (NAEB)
Introduced	1950s
Physical conditions	Tropical climate with well-distributed rainfall and sunny days; high ground; acidic soils
Area	More than 33,000 ha in the Northern, Western and Southern provinces
Organisation	19 private factories; over 50,000 farmers in 23 cooperatives and out-grower companies, grouped in five unions under FERWACOTHE; about 65% of green leaf from smallholders, 35% from industrial blocs
Production	5,910 tonnes of made tea in 1980; 40,003 tonnes by June 2024
Exports, 2023–24	38,467.7 tonnes for US$114.8 million; 97.3% exported in raw (bulk) form; 80% sold at auction, mainly at Mombasa
New projects	Rugabano (Karongi, with Luxmi Tea): 1,859 ha planted, factory since 2019. Nyaruguru (with Unilever, now Lipton): 2,843 ha planted, Kibeho factory since March 2024

Why there? Tea needs heavy, well-spread rain, cool temperatures and acidic, well-drained soils: the Congo–Nile Ridge and the northern highlands. Freshly plucked leaf must reach a factory within hours, so factories are built among the fields; and land was available at the edges of the mountain forests (lesson 3 of unit 7 shows the buffer zones).

Worked example 1: tea's growth and value

Data (NAEB). Production rose from 5,910 t (1980) to 40,003 t (2024). Exports in 2023–24: 38,467.7 t for US$114.8 million.

r = \left(\frac{40\,003}{5\,910}\right)^{\frac{1}{44}} - 1 = 0.044 = 4.4\%\ \text{a year} \qquad \text{price} = \frac{114\,800\,000}{38\,467\,700\ \text{kg}} = 2.98\ \text{US dollars per kg}

Interpretation. Output has grown steadily by about 4.4% a year for 44 years. Because 97.3% is sold in bulk, most of the extra value from blending and packing is earned abroad; processing more tea in Rwanda would raise the price per kilogram.

Case study 2: sugar cane at Kabuye

Owner and land. The Kabuye sugar factory was bought by the Madhvani Group in 1997, and acquired land around the Nyabugogo and Nyabarongo rivers (MINAGRI).
Why there? Sugar cane needs warmth, a lot of water and deep, fertile soils: the low, flat, alluvial valley floors near Kigali, which can be drained and irrigated, and are close to the market.
Expansion (2017 plans). More cane in the Nyabarongo valley towards Bugesera, on the Masaka marshland and on irrigated uplands in Bugesera; plant capacity to rise to 50,000 tonnes of sugar a year, against a demand of up to 80,000 tonnes (MINAGRI).
Outgrowers. A 2013 agreement with MINAGRI required the company to involve farmers in a public–private partnership.

Worked example 2: how far could Kabuye cut sugar imports?

\text{self-sufficiency} = \frac{50\,000}{80\,000} \times 100 = 62.5\% \qquad \text{imports still needed} = 80\,000 - 50\,000 = 30\,000\ \text{t}

Even at full planned capacity, Rwanda would still import more than a third of its sugar. This matches the minister's call to cover 62.5% of the market (MINAGRI, 2017).

Advantages and disadvantages of plantation farming

Advantages	Disadvantages
Foreign exchange: tea earned US$114.8 million in 2023–24	Dependence on world prices and auctions for one crop
Jobs for pluckers, factory workers and outgrowers	Low wages and seasonal work for many labourers
Roads, factories, schools and health centres built on estates	Land taken from food crops; marshlands drained for cane
Quality control and technology spread to outgrowers	Monoculture: soil exhaustion, pests and diseases, heavy fertiliser use
Tea bushes protect steep slopes from erosion; estates form buffers around forests	Most profit leaves with raw exports (97.3% of tea sold in bulk)

Warning

Not every export crop is a plantation crop. Coffee is grown mostly by smallholders (about 400,000 families); tea is grown both on factory estates and by 50,000 outgrowers, who supply about 65% of the leaf. Say which system you mean.

National Agricultural Export Development Board (NAEB): "Rwanda Tea promotional video". Rwanda's tea estates, factories and markets. List the stages from plucking to export that you see.

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Practice

Define plantation farming and give two characteristics.
Explain three physical and two human factors favouring tea growing in Rwanda.
Why are tea factories built close to the tea fields?
Smallholders supply about 65% of the green leaf. If made tea production was 40,003 t, about how much came from smallholders' leaf?
Explain why the Kabuye sugar estate is located in the Nyabarongo valley.
Give three advantages and three disadvantages of plantation farming in Rwanda.
"Rwanda should process more of its tea before exporting it." Evaluate.

Show answersHide answers

Large-scale growing of one cash crop, often for export. Characteristics: large estate with a factory; hired labour; heavy capital investment; scientific management; monoculture.
Physical: well-distributed rainfall; high altitude and cool climate; acidic, well-drained soils. Human: private investment and factories; organised cooperatives and outgrowers; government support (NAEB, tea expansion programme); auction markets at Mombasa.
Green leaf wilts and loses quality within hours, and it is bulky, so it must be processed quickly near where it is plucked.
$0.65 \times 40\,003 \approx 26\,000$ t.
Warm, low, flat valley floors with deep alluvial soil and plenty of water for irrigation; land around the Nyabugogo and Nyabarongo rivers was acquired by the company; Kigali is close as a market.
Advantages: foreign exchange, jobs, infrastructure, technology, erosion control by tea bushes. Disadvantages: dependence on prices, low wages, land and wetland loss, monoculture problems, value lost by exporting raw.
For: more jobs, higher value per kg (now about US$2.98 in bulk), branding of "Rwanda tea". Against: needs investment, packaging and access to retail markets where big blenders dominate; auctions provide reliable buyers. Conclusion: increase processing gradually (packing, speciality and green teas) while keeping auction sales.

Quick check

According to NAEB, which conditions favour tea in Rwanda?

Key points

Plantation farming: large-scale cash crops with factories, capital and hired labour; in Rwanda tea, sugar cane and pyrethrum.
Tea (NAEB): over 33,000 ha, 19 factories, over 50,000 farmers; 40,003 t (2024) from 5,910 t (1980); exports US$114.8 million (2023–24), 97.3% in bulk.
Tea grows on the high, wet, acidic-soiled west and north; factories sit among the fields.
Sugar: Kabuye estate (Madhvani Group since 1997) on the Nyabugogo–Nyabarongo valley floors; planned 50,000 t a year against demand up to 80,000 t.

Sources and credits

Sources: About Rwanda Tea, Tea stakeholders (factory list) and Rwanda Coffee, National Agricultural Export Development Board (NAEB); Kabuye Sugar Works to reduce sugar imports, MINAGRI, 2017; Rwanda State of Environment and Outlook Report, REMA, 2009 (pyrethrum as a commercial crop of the volcanic region).

Figure 2 was drawn by Ganzaa: factory and park positions © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL); district boundaries from geoBoundaries, CC BY 4.0; Natural Earth, public domain. The worked examples were written by Ganzaa.

Photos: Tea picking on the edge of Nyungwe National Park, travelmag.com, CC BY 2.0; Sugarcane from Western Rwanda, Synkubito, CC0; Pyrethrum Farm near Bisoke Mountain, Adygrafix250, CC BY 4.0; via Wikimedia Commons.

Video: "Rwanda Tea promotional video", National Agricultural Export Development Board, embedded from YouTube. The rest of the lesson and the exercises were written by Ganzaa.

1Nineteen factories on the high, wet hills

2Plantation crops in Rwanda

3Case study 1: tea

4Case study 2: sugar cane at Kabuye

5Advantages and disadvantages of plantation farming

Nineteen factories on the high, wet hills

Plantation crops in Rwanda

Case study 1: tea

Case study 2: sugar cane at Kabuye

Advantages and disadvantages of plantation farming