JAA’s Executive Vice President, Joe Lowther, conducted workshops on policy development and implementation and public private dialogue for the USAID Rwanda Feed the Future Kungahara Wagura Amasoko (Prosper as you expand markets) project. During a two day workshop the project team discussed JAA’s innovative methodologies and tools and adapted them for Rwanda and the project public and private sector partners. Then Mr. Lowther led a one day workshop with project partners to discuss how to apply the methodologies and tools and which priority policies to apply them to.

The project team and partners felt that the approaches discussed were exactly what was needed to better plan and implement high-value agriculture policies. Over the coming months, they will be applied to improve policies, legislation and institutions relating to contract farming, certifications and standards, and other key issues.

The FTF KWA project aims to inclusively and sustainably boost economic growth by increasing the export of high value agricultural products. FTF KWA will achieve this goal by working with and through the Government of Rwanda (GOR), the private sector, and civil society to facilitate $300 million in new investments into the sector, through two fundamental objectives: i) facilitating an inclusive and resilient policy and regulatory environment and ii) supporting local actors to attract investment. The prime contractor is RTI International, and JAA supports RTI by managing implementation of the first objective on the policy and regulatory environment.