Rwanda’s leading manufacturer of high quality nutritious foods, Africa Improved Foods is celebrating one year of operations in the country. The company that has become largely known for its world class nutrition products; Nootri Mama, Nootri Toto and the latest Nootri Family (for all age groups) has today marked a year since its official launch end of May 2017 in the country.
Speaking at a panel during a country wide media tour with international and local journalists, the Chief Executive Officer, Amar Ali noted the ongoing impact of the company’s work in its one year of existence, “We are working hard to address the issue of malnutrition while encouraging local production and improving the quality of yields, there are similar projects but none that combines elements such as fighting malnutrition in a public private partnership model like this one,” he said.
The impact of AIF has been widely recognized in Rwanda with a range of awards in its short life span that includes the Investor of the year award by the Rwanda Development Board. Malnutrition still remains a key public health concern in the country and has been put at the forefront of the Government’s vision 2020 Agenda. Also speaking at the round table, Hugh Welsh the President, DSM North America attributed the company’s success to its unique
model,” The great thing about this model is that it engages the community which not only makes it progressive but also sustainable in the long run” he said.
Besides the widely known Nootri brand, Africa Improved Foods continues to produce porridge flours (with added milk, vitamins and minerals) targeting vulnerable population segments such as pregnant and breast-feeding mothers, older infants and young children more especially in the first 1,000 days of their lives. With the Government of Rwanda, AIF has nutrition programs such as “Shisha Kibondo” for the most impoverished communities. The
company is also producing relief foods for the World Food Programme that are distributed as far as Somalia and South Sudan.
On behalf of the Rwanda Development Board, “We want to thank AIF for showing that we can achieve it. They made it possible to produce fortified foods locally. We thank them for improving the value chain by enabling better and improved foods”, Winifred Ngarure, the Head of Investment Promotion at RDB said.
Africa Improved Foods is located in the Kigali’s Special Economic Zone, sitting on 40,000m² of land and employing over 300 staff. The plant has an annual production capacity of 45,000 tons making it one of the largest nutrition factory sites on the continent. AIF works with over 9,000 farmers across Rwanda and produces meals for 1.5 Million people every day.
ABOUT AFRICA IMPROVED FOODS
AIF Rwanda is a joint-venture between the Government of Rwanda and a consortium of Royal DSM, the Dutch development bank (FMO), DFID Impact Acceleration Facility managed by CDC Group plc and the investment arm of the World Bank (IFC). It is the leading manufacturer of high quality and nutritious complementary foods.
