Vision 2020 was a government development program in Rwanda, launched in 2000 by Rwandan president Paul Kagame.
Its main objective is transforming the country into a knowledge-based middle-income country, thereby reducing poverty, health problems and making the nation united and democratic.
The programme contained of a list of goals which the government aims to achieve before the year 2020: [1] [2]
In the late 1990s, president Paul Kagame and his government began actively planning methods to achieve national development. He launched a national consultation process [2] and also sought the advice of experts from emerging nations including China, Singapore and Thailand. [1] Following these consultations, and shortly after assuming the presidency, Kagame launched Vision 2020. [1] The major purposes of the programme were to unite the Rwandan people and to transform Rwanda from a highly impoverished into a middle income country. [2]
In 2011, the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning (MINECOFIN) issued a report indicating the progress of the Vision 2020 goals. [3] The report examined the stated goals of the programme and rated each one with a status of "on-track", "on-watch" or "off-track". Of 44 goals, it found that 66% were on-track, 11% were on-watch, and 22% were off-track. [3] The major areas identified as off-track were population, poverty and the environment. [3] By 2012, MINECOFIN's review found that 26% of Vision 2020's original indicators had already been achieved. [4] While also highlighting key areas for improvement, the review made several upward revisions, including revising the GDP per capita target from $900 to $1,240. [5] In the same year, an independent review of the strategy carried out by academics based in Belgium rated progress as "quite encouraging", mentioning development in the education and health sectors, as well as Kagame's fostering of a favourable business environment. [6] The review also raised concerns about the policy of "maximum growth at any cost", suggesting that this was leading to a situation in which the rich prospered while the rural poor saw little benefit. [6]
In November 2013, Kagame told This Is Africa “Our thinking is based on people. In national budgets, we focus on education, health, we look at technology, skills, innovation, creativity. We are always thinking about people, people, people.” [7]
In December 2020, Kagame and the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning announced the project's successor: Vision 2050. As Kagame put it: "Vision 2020 was about what we had to do in order to survive and regain our dignity. But Vision 2050 has to be about the future we choose, because we can, and because we deserve it." [8] Vision 2050 focuses around the pillars of Economic Growth and Prosperity and High Quality of Life and Standards of Life for Rwandans. [8] Crucially, it aims for Rwanda to become an upper-middle income country by 2035, and a high-income country by 2050. [8]
Extreme poverty is the most severe type of poverty, defined by the United Nations (UN) as "a condition characterized by severe deprivation of basic human needs, including food, safe drinking water, sanitation facilities, health, shelter, education and information. It depends not only on income but also on access to services". Historically, other definitions have been proposed within the United Nations.
Rwanda, officially the Republic of Rwanda, is a landlocked country in the Great Rift Valley of East Africa, where the African Great Lakes region and Southeast Africa converge. Located a few degrees south of the Equator, Rwanda is bordered by Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is highly elevated, giving it the sobriquet "land of a thousand hills", with its geography dominated by mountains in the west and savanna to the southeast, with numerous lakes throughout the country. The climate is temperate to subtropical, with two rainy seasons and two dry seasons each year. It is the most densely populated mainland African country; among countries larger than 10,000 km2, it is the fifth-most densely populated country in the world. Its capital and largest city is Kigali.
Rwanda is a de facto one-party state ruled by the Rwandan Patriotic Front and its leader Paul Kagame since the end of the 1994 genocide against members of the Tutsi ethnic group. Although Rwanda is nominally democratic, elections are manipulated in various ways, which include banning opposition parties, arresting or assassinating critics, and electoral fraud.
Paul Kagame is a Rwandan politician and former military officer who has been the President of Rwanda since 2000. He was previously a commander of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), a rebel armed force which invaded Rwanda in 1990. The RPF was one of the parties of the conflict during the Rwandan Civil War and the armed force which ended the Rwandan genocide. He was considered Rwanda's de facto leader when he was Vice President and Minister of Defence under President Pasteur Bizimungu from 1994 to 2000 after which the vice-presidential post was abolished.
The Rwandan Patriotic Front is the ruling political party in Rwanda.
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Rosemary Museminali is a Rwandan politician and diplomat, currently working for the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), as its representative at the African Union and United Nations Economic Commission for Africa. Museminali is best known for her role as the Rwandan Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation from 2005 until 2009. She has also served as the country's Minister of State for International Cooperation and as ambassador to the United Kingdom.
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Claver Gatete is a Rwandan politician and diplomat who has been serving as the Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa since 2023.
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Uzziel Ndagijimana is a Rwandan economist who has been serving as Minister of Finance and Economic Planning in the government of President Paul Kagame since 2018.
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Vision 2050 is the Rwandan national development strategy, launched in December 2020 by President Paul Kagame and the country's Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning (MINECOFIN).
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