Journal of Humanitarian Assistance
The physical setting
With just over 26,000 square kilometres, Rwanda is one of the smallest countries in Africa, comparable in size to its southern neighbour, Burundi, and to its former colonial power, Belgium. Situated immediately south of the Equator, it borders on Zaire, Uganda, Tanzania and Burundi. Often called "the Land of a Thousand Hills" or "the Switzerland of Africa", Rwanda is dominated by mountain ranges and highland plateaus of the great watershed between the Nile and the Zaire river basins (Congo-Nile Divide). The populous central part - from Ruhengeri in the north to Butare in the south - lies between 1,500 and 2,000 metres above sea-level. West of the central plateau, the Congo-Nile Divide reaches altitudes above 2,500 metres, with the highest parts in the north-western volcanic Virunga chain. Here, the Karasimbi peak reaches 4,507 metres. Lake Kivu - which separates Rwanda from Zaire - lies 1,460 metres above sea-level and is the highest lake in Africa. East of the central plateau, i.e. from the capital, Kigali, to the border with Tanzania, the land gradually gets lower, but is still within the 1,000-1,500 metre range and with a number of higher areas.
Although Rwanda is just below the Equator, the high altitudes moderate the climate. The average annual temperature in Kigali is 19 degrees Celsius, with only small variations between rainy and dry seasons. Rwanda enjoys rich rainfall from October to June, followed by a short dry season in July to September. The average monthly rainfall on the central plateau is 85 millimetres, which supports a wide range of crops grown on every available patch of land. The moderated tropical climate supports two, and sometimes three, agricultural seasons a year, which gives parts of the country a potential for agricultural production unparalleled by most African countries.
Rwanda is a land-locked country, which for its economy depends on a costly and vulnerable transit trade to the Indian Ocean through Tanzania or Uganda and Kenya, or to the Atlantic through Zaire. The distance from Kigali to the Indian Ocean is approximately 1,500 kilometres and to the Atlantic coast some 2,000 kilometres.
Not less than 10 percent of Rwanda's area has been protected as national parks or forest reserves, considerably more than in most other African countries. The best-known of the parks are Virunga on the border with Zaire in the north-west and Akagera on the eastern border with Tanzania. The Virunga park - made famous through the film, Gorillas in the Mist - is home to the last mountain gorillas, while the savannas of Akagera sustain a wildlife as varied as that of the better-known game parks in Kenya and Tanzania.
For administrative purposes, Rwanda is divided into 10 préfectures (regions), each headed by a préfet (prefect) appointed by the President of the Republic. The préfectures are divided into 143 communes, governed by a bourgemestre (mayor). The mayors are also appointed by the President.
Demographic and social feature
According to the 1991 census, in August of that year Rwanda had a total population of 7.15 million, with an annual increase of 3.1%. This translates into a very high population density. In fact, with 271 people per square kilometre, it was the highest in mainland Africa; if lakes, national parks and forest reserves are excluded, it was far higher. Thus, the actual area of arable agricultural land (some 17,600 square kilometres out of the total of 26,300) had to support an average of 406 people per square kilometre over the whole country. The most densely-populated area was Ruhondo in the Ruhengeri préfecture, with some 820 people per square kilometre of usable land. At the other end of the scale was Rusomo (Kibungo), with 62 people to the same unit (République Rwandaise, 1993:II).
The reasons behind Rwanda's historically high population density are many. Both land and climate are generous. In addition, the mountainous area has been protective. The natural fortress formed by the highlands served as a shield against hostile intruders, such as the nineteenth century Swahili slave traders from the Indian Ocean coast. Coupled with effective military structures, the Rwandese society was thus one of the very few in Africa that were saved from the ravages of the Arab and European slave trades. As a result, the population was not reduced by this trade but actually increased as other people sought refuge in the country (Waller, 1993; Prunier 1995). In addition, the strong influence of the Catholic church against population control measures, as well as the traditional position of women, are important explanatory factors for the high population growth.
Rwanda is a country of peasant farmers, or rather large-scale gardeners. The crucial question of land will be presented below. Already here, however, it should be stated that many observers link the tragedy that unfolded in 1994 to high population pressure and increasing competition for means of survival. Thus, in the words of Prunier (1995):
the decision to kill was of course made by politicians, for political reasons. But at least part of the reason why it was carried out so thoroughly by the ordinary rank-and-file peasants (...) was the feeling that there were too many people on too little land, and that with a few less there would be more for the survivors... (Prunier, 1995).
According to the 1991 census, 90.4% (or some 6.5 million) of the resident population in Rwanda was Hutu, 8.2% (0.6 million) Tutsi and 0.4% (approximately 30,000) Twa. In general, though with some exceptions, commentators are in agreement that these figures reflect the reality. They also correspond to the results obtained when extrapolating from earlier census and migration data. The historical relationship between Hutu and Tutsi is discussed below. Here it should be noted that the marginalized minority of pygmoid Twa actually consists of two groups: those making a living from pottery and those who live by hunting and gathering. The latter group - also known as Impunyu - numbers less than 5,000 people and is concentrated in the Ruhengeri and Gisenyi préfectures. They are often exploited and looked down upon by their fellow Rwandese.
In 1991, there were some 1.5 million households with an average of 4.7 members in Rwanda. The dominance of agriculture - and traditional life - is underlined by the fact that not less than 94.6% of the population lived in the countryside, while almost two-thirds of the urban population were concentrated to Kigali. Rwanda is thus a rural country, where most of the people live and farm on hills (collines in French or musozi in kinyarwanda), which form the basis of the society. This has determined a very precise and peculiar form of human settlement. The Rwandese peasant - Hutu or Tutsi - is part of a rugo, which broadly translates into enclosure, compound or household. (In a polygamous household, each wife occupies her own rugo). Every hill consists of several ingo (plural for rugo), where Hutu and Tutsi traditionally live side by side on the same slopes, "for better or for worse; for intermarriage or for massacre" (Prunier, 1995).
The 1991 census showed that 48% of the population was below the age of 15 and that the average life expectancy was 53.1 years. At the same time - i.e. before the massacres and the demographic upheavals of 1994/95 - more than 20% of the sexually active adults in the urban areas were infected with the HIV virus (The Economist Intelligence Unit, 1995). Women get infected at younger ages and in greater numbers than men. It is estimated that between 100,000 and 200,000 Rwandese in their prime age will die from AIDS by the year 2,000.
A large section of the rural population suffers from endemic diseases such as bilharzia, diarrhoea, dysentery and respiratory infections. Water-related diseases are the main causes of death among children. According to World Bank estimates, the infant mortality rate fell from 142 per 1,000 in 1970 to 117 in 1992. In 1992, 1.5 million Rwandese were without access to health services; 2.6 million were without potable water, and 3.2 million without sanitation (The Economist Intelligence Unit, 1995).
The official language of administration is French, but people communicate in the common national vernacular kinyarwanda and, as a lingua franca for traders, Swahili (while returnees from Uganda and Tanzania also speak English). According to the 1991 census, 44% of the population could not read or write, with a higher illiteracy rate among women (50%) than among men (37%). The World Bank estimates that 71% of primary age Rwandese attended school in 1991, compared with 68% in 1970. However, only 8% benefitted from secondary and less than 1% from tertiary education.
The Catholic church has played a major role in Rwanda's history. In a sense, it would be more appropriate to characterize the colonization of Rwanda as a venture by the French Catholic "White Fathers" than by the German Empire. They arrived in 1899, and had within a few years set up a number of missions around the country. During the colonial period, the Catholic church worked hand-in-hand with the German and Belgian authorities, and after Independence there has been a remarkably high degree of political intertwining between the Church and the state.
The founding fathers of modern Hutu nationalism - among them the future President, Grégoire Kayibanda - all formed part of the small elite of so-called évolués educated at Catholic schools and seminars. In the mid-1970s, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Kigali, Vincent Nsengiyumwa, became a member of the Central Committee of the ruling MNRD party, official confessor to President Habyarimana's wife and close to the akazu inner circle of Hutu nationalists.
The wide spread of Christianity in Rwanda should be seen against this background. According to the 1991 census, not less than 90% of the population was Christian, out of which 63% Catholic, 19% Protestant and some 8% Adventist. The Muslim faith has a certain following in Kigali and in other urban centres, but is of marginal importance on a national scale, representing just over 1% of the population.
Employment data, finally, are sketchy, since only about 4% of Rwanda's population live wholly within the cash economy. World Bank statistics for 1985 suggest that 93% of the labour force worked in the agricultural sector (well above the average for sub-Saharan Africa), 3% in industry and 4% in the service sector. In the beginning of the 1990s, the biggest employer in the formal sector was the government, with about 7,000 employees in the central and some 43,000 in the local administration, not including personnel in the armed forces.
The overwhelming majority of peasant farmers are self-employed, and neither the government nor the small industrial sector can absorb the annual physical increase of the working population. Thus, the agricultural sector has had to support the rapid demographic growth, which, however, in many regions has outstripped the rise in agricultural yields. Few rural households therefore survived on farming alone. In 1990, the government estimated that 81% also earned money from informal activities such as brick-making, carpentry and sewing. In addition, almost everyone was active in the parallel or "black" economy, if only from time to time. This included cross-border trade and barter, or smuggling, with neighbouring countries (The Economist Intelligence Unit, 1995).
The land question
Already in 1984, 57% of rural households in Rwanda farmed less than one hectare of land and 25% had less than half a hectare, from which they had to feed an average family of five people. With the growth of the population, the inheritance laws - dividing a family's rights to use land among all the remaining sons - ensured that the size of the holdings would continue to fall and be increasingly fragmented into small plots, scattered over wider areas. Thus, in the beginning of the 1990s, the average Rwandese household farmed at least five plots of land, each with its specific characteristics of fertility, accessibility and form of tenancy.
On the diverse plots, the household must produce a constant supply of food throughout the year. This involves highly sophisticated decisions. Preferably, the crops should be of more than one type so that, for example, carbohydrate-rich crops such as potatoes can complement protein-rich crops such as beans. In addition, the farmer must also take into account the degree to which the different crops require fertile soils or can tolerate poorer soils etc. Thus, a study (quoted by Waller, 1993) showed that in order to preserve soil fertility, in 1993 farmers in one area in southern Rwanda grew 14 different crops in almost 50 rotations.
Under increasing population pressure, such a complex system is difficult to maintain, and during the 1980s more and more families could no longer afford to let their plots rest and recover through periods of fallow. The result was reduced soil fertility and short-term survival strategies, such as farming on the steepest slopes, even though the peasants knew that such practices were not sustainable. In the beginning of the 1990s, half of Rwanda's farming was done on slopes of more than 10% inclination, where rainfall often washed away both the soil and the crops. In turn, for an increasing part of the peasantry this translated into malnutrition and deeper poverty. According to a report by the Ministry of Agriculture, in 1984 the agricultural population of Rwanda numbered some 5.5 million. On average each person consumed 49 grammes of protein per day (which should be compared with the internationally recommended minimum of 59 grammes). By 1989, the agricultural population had risen to 6.5 million, but the average daily intake of protein was now down to 36 grammes per person (Waller, 1993).
The position of women
As in other African countries, the legal position of women in Rwanda is ambiguous. The 1991 constitution stipulates that all citizens are equal, while at the same time accepting the validity of traditional law in areas where there is no written code. This includes the important question of inheritance. The main problem is that the law does not consider the woman legally "competent" and only recognizes the man as the head of the household. A woman can acquire land for usufruct by settlement from her parents, or by inheritance if she has no brothers, but upon marriage it becomes the husband's property and if the marriage ends in divorce she cannot claim it. If her husband dies, the wife inherits nothing. In effect, a woman can own nothing legally, neither house, tools, livestock, nor crops. This lack of legal status causes particular problems in rural households headed by single women (22% of the total in 1984). In the modern sector of the economy, a woman's legal incapacity means that she cannot open a bank account without the permission of the husband, or - if unmarried - a male relative. Combined with her inability to own assets, this makes it almost impossible for her to obtain any loans.
In the area of government and administration, there were no women ministers until the coalition government of 1992. Nor were there any women préfets or bourgemestres; 97% of all economically active women are farmers, responsible for feeding their families and running almost all aspects of the household, including farming activities such as sowing, weeding and harvesting, in addition to fetching wood and water. In the beginning of the 1990s women did 54% of all agricultural work and had on average 20% less free time than men. In spite of this, 38% of rural women had never had any contact with a government agricultural extension agent (Waller, 1993).
Of late, Rwandese women have become increasingly conscious of the injustice of their position in society. Thus, associations of women working together in the rural areas grew in strength throughout the 1980s. Within these associations women have acquired a de facto legal status through which they can gain access to land and credit. In times of political turmoil and upheavals - such as in 1994 - under the traditional, male-dominated and conservative political culture, women in general, however, have not exercised a moderating influence.
The economy
Except for under-exploited hydroelectric sites, Rwanda has very limited natural resources and the economy has almost exclusively been built around the two cash crops, coffee and tea.The manufacturing sector, however, has grown in importance since Independence, rising from virtually nothing to around 16% of the gross domestic product (GDP) in 1992. Before the 1994 upheavals - which badly hit the industrial infrastructure, management and workforce - the most important sub-sectors comprised the production of beverages and food, detergents, textiles and agricultural tools, such as hoes and machetes.
According to World Bank figures, Rwanda's GDP grew in real terms by an impressive annual average of 4.7% in the period 1970-1979, but slowed down to a 2.2% in 1980-88. In 1989, GDP fell significantly due to a sharp fall in coffee earnings. The decline continued in 1991, 1992 and 1993, and was for obvious reasons particularly devastating in 1994. GDP per capita was estimated at US$200 in 1993, compared with US$330 in 1989, i.e. a decrease of about 40% in only four years (The Economist Intelligence Unit, 1995).
Coffee is by far Rwanda's most important cash crop. The variety grown is predominantly arabica and is classed with "other milds" on the world market. It was first introduced into the country by the Belgian administration in the 1920s. The Belgians planted coffee extensively and decreed that taxes be paid in cash rather than in kind, to further force its cultivation. The colonial authorities later made coffee cultivation compulsory in many areas, a law that exists virtually unamended until today (The Economist Intelligence Unit, 1995). From its introduction, coffee production expanded until by 1986 exports - peaking at more than 42,000 tonnes - accounted for 82% of Rwanda's total export earnings. However, following the collapse of international coffee prices in 1989 and the war from October 1990, this share has constantly fallen. It stood at 51% in 1992 and should be considerably lower after the tragedy of 1994, which left coffee bushes damaged, untended and diseased all over the country. It has been estimated that it will take at least three years for them to recover.
All the coffee producers in Rwanda are smallholders, who are obliged to grow some coffee on their plots. (In Rwanda, the land belongs to the state. Individual farmers have the right only to use the land, not to own it, and the State can reclaim land for its own use, without compensation for the losses (Waller, 1993).) In 1989, there were almost 700,000 coffee farmers - or about 60% of all smallholders in the country - each growing an average of 150 bushes. During most of the 1980s, the government assured them a guaranteed price of 125 Rwanda francs (RWF) per kilo, which until 1987 meant that the price paid to the producers was less than the strong world price and, consequently, that the government made huge profits from the coffee trade. However, the world price began to fall and in 1989 Rwanda, like other small coffee-producing countries, was severly hit by the collapse of the International Coffee Agreement, which in turn led to a fall of the price on the London market to half its 1980 level. Against this background, the Rwandese government cut the price to the producers to 115 RWF per kilo and - within the 1990 Structural Adjustment Programme with the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) - devalued the national currency by as much as 40%. An additional devaluation of 15% was made in June 1992.
While the restructuring was inevitable, from the point of view of the Rwandese peasant farmer it made coffee cultivation even less attractive than before. In one year - from 1989 to 1990 - the average farmer actually responded to the crisis by increasing production considerably, only to earn about 20% less. As the coffee bushes yielded a crop of substantially less value per hectare in local currency than, for example, bananas or beans, many Rwandese peasants were desperate to rip up their coffee plants in favour of other crops (Waller, 1993).
In addition to coffee, tea has developed into a significant foreign exchange earner, rising from 9% of export receipts in 1986 to 30% in 1992. Unlike coffee, tea is primarily grown on big estates, of which all except one are government-owned. Between them, the plantations cover 1% of Rwanda's cultivated area. In some places, such as Nkuli (Ruhengeri), tea estates have been introduced in areas previously settled by peasant farmers. The annual harvests during the period 1988-1992 fluctuated around 13,000 tonnes. However, the cultivation of tea, like that of coffee, was badly hit by the war from October 1990.
Taken as a whole, the 1980s saw a dramatic decline in Rwanda's economic fortunes and at the end of the decade the economy worsened in every key area, such as GDP growth, balance of payments, terms of trade and indebtedness (tables 1-8 in Appendix 1). The stagnating GDP has been commented upon above. The balance of payments also deteriorated from 1985, and in 1989 the value of imported goods was 3.5 times higher than the value of goods exported. This was largely a consequence of the decline in Rwanda's terms of trade, or international purchasing power, which fell by 47% between 1980 and 1987. Very few countries experienced such drastic declines over the same period. Finally, the ensuing external debt - which in 1980 stood at US$189 million - rose virtually constantly throughout the 1980s and had in 1992 jumped to US$873 million (Waller, 1993; Vassall-Adams, 1994; and The Economist Intelligence Unit, 1995).
The 1990 and 1992 structural adjustment programmes coincided with the war that started with the invasion by the Rwandese Patriotic Front in October 1990. It is, thus, difficult to assess its macro-economic impact. In addition to the hardships experienced by the coffee-growing peasants, there is, however, ample evidence that the introduction of higher fees for health and education, among other things, added to the already heavy burdens of Rwanda's poor (Vassall-Adams, 1994; Marysse, 1993 and 1994).
The war had a devastating effect on Rwanda's economy. First, it displaced hundreds of thousands of peasant farmers in northern Rwanda, with a dramatic impact on both coffee and food production. Second, it cut off the road to the Kenyan port of Mombasa, Rwanda's main overland route to the outside world. Third, it destroyed the country's fledgling tourist industry, which had become the third largest earner of foreign exchange. Finally, it prompted the government to enlarge its armed forces dramatically, thereby reducing national resources available for other purposes (Vassall-Adams, 1994).