KIGALI, Rwanda

The European Union on Tuesday announced new funding worth €40 million (about $44.4 million) for local manufacturing and equitable access to quality, safe, effective, and affordable health products in Rwanda.

The grant funding was announced on the margins of a two-day East Africa Pharma and Biotech conference in Rwanda’s capital Kigali.

The funding is aimed at increasing equitable access to medicines and health care products with multiple new EU-funded projects, including pharmaceutical research and development, skills development, entrepreneurship, supply chains, and regulatory strengthening.

The projects were committed to last December by EU President Ursula von der Leyen during a meeting with Rwandan President Paul Kagame.

“These projects will support Rwanda in its vision of becoming a regional hub for the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry, and to establish domestic pharmaceutical and vaccine production,” said Belen Calvo Uyarra, the European Union ambassador to Rwanda.

The funding complements other activities of the EU and its member states under the Team Europe Initiative on Manufacturing and Access to Vaccines, Medicines, and Health Technologies in Africa (MAV+) Rwanda inclusive.

Yvan Butera, Rwanda’s minister of state for health, said the government is committed to building a pharmaceutical manufacturing hub to facilitate access to medical products within Rwanda and across Africa.

He said the funding signaled that developing local pharmaceutical manufacturing capacity and addressing global health imbalances continues to be a priority.

Implementation of the projects will be done by EU member state agencies in close collaboration with the Rwandan government.