Despite a tax exemption on imported raw materials for the textiles industry, many residents, especially those in rural areas cannot afford garments made in Rwanda.

Industry players attribute it to the high import costs, saying that as a result, the country could fail to become fully reliant on homemade garments as per government’s ambitions.

Christian Iyamuremye, a co-founder of a local textiles firm called Afriek said that the sector could help diversify exports and reduce government’s vulnerability to global market volatilities if government intervened.

“Currently, Rwanda’s ‘revealed comparative advantage’ [a commodity in which a country has an advantage over its competitors] is tea. We cannot continue to have a strong currency while relying on a single commodity,” said Mr Iyamuremye.

Didier Ndahimana, the owner of Africa Close Design said quality raw materials are expensive which make made-in-Rwanda garments pricey. For example, if it costs round Rwf1,000 to produce a quality local shirt, a automatically sellers are forced to offer it for around Rwf1,200 to Rwf1,500.

“The same shirt with cheap material made in China costs half the price,” he said, adding, “It is upon the government to either help negotiate with international investors to invest in the production of raw materials locally or make imports more affordable.”

But according to Dian Mukasahaha, the chairperson of the Board of Directors at Aparo Manufacturing Group, raw materials only become expensive if they are bought in small quantities.

After realising this, a group of us involved in this business joint forces and now we import raw materials jointly,” said Ms Mukasahaha. “This has helped us to engage manufacturers in China directly, and buy the materials in bulk at discounted rates.”

She added: “Before forming this group, a man’s shirt, trouser, and a women dress cost about Rwf15,000, Rwf20,000, and Rwf15,000 respectively; now, the price of each of the garments is down by some Rwf7,500.”

Telesphore Mugwiza, the director of Industry Development at the Ministry of Trade and Industry said, the textile sector still faces many challenges top of which include the high costs of electricity and low capacity utilisation.

“Even when raw materials are available, we operate below capacity which adds to the cost of production and eats into profits,” said Mr Mugwiza. “For example, a machine meant to produce 500 shirts per day produces 100 shirts while fuels or electricity consumption remains constant; about 75 per cent of all local manufacture work under such conditions which automatically raise the cost of production.”