Empowerment for indigenous People; Batwa in Rwanda

Dear Patrons,
We are happy to share with you the background of the Indigenous peoples or Batwa community in Rwanda:

Among sub-Saharan African countries, Rwanda is one of the top-performing countries in education. 98% of children are enrolled in primary school. However, there are still several challenges in education. Although nearly every child enrolls in primary school, only 71 percent of children complete their primary education.
The indigenous’ educational level remains the lowest and the dropout rate the highest in Rwanda. According to the survey conducted by COPORWA, only 34% of indigenous people had attended school, less than 1% secondary school and no one had completed higher education.

Generally, the unemployment rate in Rwanda increased to 23.8 % in November 2021. Indigenous Groups had higher rates of temporary employment (35%) and other informal jobs (38.3%) but low rates of full-time employment (0%), as well as farming (26.7%), compared to other people with fair socio-economic status. When analyzing monthly income, 68.3% of the indigenous people belonged to category 1 in Rwanda, which is composed of families who cannot afford basic needs.

Before the planning of this proposed project, we conducted a needs assessment for indigenous and most vulnerable people, in Rulindo District to identify their needs and existing gaps. The survey revealed that above 85% of indigenous in the Rulindo District live under the poverty line. They live in chronic poverty with high risks of different diseases or conditions such as malnutrition, worm infestation, infectious diseases, etc. compared to other people in Rwanda.
The main problem to be addressed by this project is the chronic poverty among indigenous because of different issues such as low education, community stigma and social discrimination, traditional beliefs, etc.

Our project will address the following root causes of chronic poverty among indigenous in the Rulindo District mainly low education, lack of confidence or self-esteem, and social stigma.
The project intends to impact the following factors:
Livelihood Level: improved living standards, and increased job opportunities.
Health Level: Increased access to health information and service delivery, and positive social behavior change.
Education level: Increased literacy and numeracy skills, child retention in educational programs.

We request you donate generously to our indigenous empowerment project so that we can achieve our goals. You could also consider making a monthly recurring donation for our project, which will help us with our ongoing work. We thank you for everything that you have done for our project, and we look forward to your continued support.

Thanks and Best Regards.

Jean Damascene UWIZEYIMANA
RWAYDAVO President