BUJUMBURA June 30th (ABP) – The First Lady of the country and Chairperson of the Office of the First Lady for Development in Burundi (OPDD-Burundi), Mrs. Angeline Ndayishimiye, received in audience on Monday, June 27, 2022 in Bujumbura, a delegation of the Rockefeller Foundation (Rockefeller Foundation) led by the latter’s regional director, Mrs. Betty Kibaara.
The Rockefeller Foundation is based in the United States of America and has its regional headquarters in Kenya. Rockefeller already exists in some African countries including Rwanda, Benin and Ghana.
In an interview given to the press at the end of the audience, the executive secretary of the OPDD-Burundi, Dr Jean Bosco Girukwishaka said that the team had come to dialogue with the First Lady on two essential projects that the Rockefeller Foundation wants to implement in Burundi. He indicated that the first project concerns support for the national school feeding program that the foundation has just signed recently with the World Food Program (WFP), which is an institution supporting the government of Burundi in the implementation of the school feeding program, a project worth one million four hundred thousand US dollars (1,400,000 USD).
According to Dr. Girukwishaka, the project will strengthen the school feeding system, particularly with regard to the production of complete and nutritious foods. The project will also support local producers in the milk value chain but also in the maize value chain by providing them with training but also certain equipment that will help produce quality milk with high nutritional value and cereals that are fortified, he indicated.
According to Mr. Girukwishaka, the second project concerns renewable energies. In this regard, he continued to say, Mrs. Kibaara informed the First Lady of Burundi that the Rockefeller Foundation has seen the expression of interest from the Government of Burundi with regard to solar energy, hence, through the Alliance energy fund of which this foundation is an active member, Burundi’s request was positively received.
Through this program, he said, the foundation intends to support 1,000 villages across the country. During their stay in Burundi, the team will meet with officials from the Ministry of Energy to discuss practical arrangements for the implementation of this program, he said.