The government of Rwanda has joined the International Consortium for Cooperation on the Nile (ICCN), a newly-founded organisation of Nile basin countries with the objective of achieving sustainable development to benefit all people of the region, the Rwanda News Agency (RNA) reported on Saturday. At a preparatory meeting for the ICCN’s first meeting scheduled to take place on 26 to 28 June in Geneva, Rwandan Minister of Energy, Water and Natural Resources Marcel Bahude said the main objective of the Nile Basin Initiatives (NBI) is to develop water resources of the Nile in a sustainable and equitable way to ensure prosperity, security and peace for all people of the Nile base region. “Promotion of economic integration in order to eliminate rampant poverty in the region and ... joint actions between the countries in the region which are seeking ‘win-win’ gains are some of the NBI’s objectives,” RNA reported Bahude as saying.
RNA also reported that World Bank representative for Rwanda, Edward Brown, stressed the need to take into consideration the impacts of projects on the environment. Brown assured the ICCN it could count on the World Bank for funding. “You can always count on our support in meeting these challenges,” RNA reported Brown as saying.
Other ICCN member countries include Burundi, DR Congo, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Sudan, Tanzania, and Uganda.
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