Rwandan retailers are blaming imported packaging materials for the high prices they are charging for common consumer goods like sugar and bread.

Manufacturers and retailers in Kigali told Rwanda Today that they incur high costs on importation of packaging materials from neighbouring countries, which adds to the final price of locally-made products. They also said that locally made packaging alternatives are not suitable for some products like beef and vegetables.

“Plastics, boxes and paper bags comprise what we need for packaging, and they come from Kenya. The prices are not an issue, but the transport costs and value added tax are making them expensive,” said Thierry Kalisa, advisor at Urwibutso Enterprise. The company spends over Rwf20 million on packaging weekly.

“Over 80 per cent of this amount is spent on imported packaging materials except for a few boxes we recently started sourcing from a local supplier,” he added.

READ: Rwanda could ban imports packed in non-biodegradable plastic

Eight years after the country banned polythene bags over environmental concerns, only a few investors have ventured into manufacture of alternative packaging materials such as paper bags, sacks, boxes and plastics.

Rwanda’s packaging industry is still in its infancy thus failing to serve the huge demand for materials like paper bags, PET bottles, and occasionally corrugated boxes.

The gap has left all the needs for packaging sourced expensively from abroad, with flour sacks, generic grocery bags and others used in commodity retail making the bigger portion of the imports.

Sacks and bags used mainly in tea and coffee export along with the cement industries also make a big chunk of packaging sourced from abroad.

A 2013 paper packaging sector profile by RDB’s Trade and Manufacturing Department found that the largest portion of the country’s packaging imports originate from Kenya and China.

RDB had not responded to our request for registered businesses in the packaging sector by press time. But officials at the Ministry of Trade, Industry and East African Community Ministry (Mineacom) said there are some, although they admit their production is still low.

“We have some companies that invested and others seeking to enter into the production of packaging materials, which is an indication that investors see it as an opportunity, and we are willing as a country to assist them,” said Annet Karenzi, the director general of Industry and Small and Medium Enterprises at Mineacom.

Analysts however argue that locals interested in the sector still find it difficult to secure the capital needed for machines, while potential foreign investors find the market not big enough to earn them substantial profits in the absence of attractive incentives along with exposure to regional competition.

Imported packaging materials cost about three to four times more than banned plastic and few locally produced packages.

The public re-uses water and juice bottles in the retail of liquid commodities, as well as homemade envelopes from ordinary papers and used cement bags.

The gap is exploited by smugglers of banned polythene bags on the black market.

Rwanda Environment Management Authority boss Coletta Ruhamya said only butchers and fish markets have been allowed to use polythene bags due to difficulties in finding appropriate alternative packaging materials in the market.

“The private sector need to venture into this as an opportunity for investment. That way people would change mindset of clinging on polythene bags because even other countries are seeking to emulate our decision,” Ms Ruhamya said.