Rwanda's role in connecting Africa

This is already my third visit to Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, in the past year. Rwanda itself is a relatively small country with few natural resources and poor economic ties with the outside world. As such, one could argue that there is little here to write about.

However, the reason I have been here more often than to any of the larger African nations is that its national strategy has turned it into a center for international conferences, where many of the future goals and perspectives of the continent are hammered out. In that respect, it has something in common with Addis Ababa.

Rwanda, known as "the country of a thousand hills", is far inland from the eastern coast of Africa. Its landlocked geography has combined with a lack of natural resources to limit its development, and it still lacks a large-scale manufacturing base, relying instead mostly on subsistence agriculture.