In 2015, the Government of Rwanda launched ‘Made in Rwanda’, a concept made to prioritize and tackle trade imbalance through encouraging more production and consumption of locally-manufactured goods.
Through a partnership initiated by Kigali Farmers’ and Artisans Market (KIGALIFAAM) founded by Florence Mwashimba, Kigali Serena Hotel has been able to promote local sourcing and the ‘Made In Rwanda’ program.
Under this partnership, Kigali Serena Hotel provides space for local farmers and artisans to showcase their products in the Farmers and Artisans Market held every first Saturday of each month. The market is predominantly attended by clients spending their sojourn at the Hotel and others who are both from the local and international market.
Kigali Serena Hotel and KIGALIFAAM have gone over the walls to bring the Rwandan market a more exciting and unique addition to this initiative, the first ever ‘Black Food Festival’ in Rwanda set to happen on Saturday, 26th October 2019 from 3pm to 9pm.
Making Kigali the second city in Africato host the international Black Food Festival and the second country in the world to franchise it after Estonia, this will therefore be a celebration to celebrate and highlight unique food, away from commonly accepted food colors in the country.
This second edition to be held at Kigali Serena Hotel will involve local brands including Women’s Bakery, Black Tee-shirts, Garden of Eden Produce, K-Dreamy Products, Kean Creations, HVD, Naturam, AMI-Body organics, Women’s Farmers and Kasha Rwanda.
Some of showcased products will range from foodstuff, works of arts, jewelries, ornaments, cookies, carpentry products, garments, natural black products and cosmetics among others all produced locally.
The brainchild behind the concept is Regina Boros, a Hungarian food enthusiast, blogger, and marketing professional from Budapest who founded the Black Food Festival initiative in 2016.
The first ever ‘Black Food Festival’ in Africa took place in Kenya on 20th October, last Sunday where various vendors and artisans gathered to display various kinds of black inspired products, ranging from baked goods, traditionally hand crafted items, accessories and Kenya’s famous traditional fermented porridge.
About Black Food Festival:
The Back Food festival which started from a simple idea in 2016 by the Founder Regina Boros, a food enthusiast and food blogger from Budapest, Hungary, wanted to create a space for culinary creatives to experiment with flavours, ingredients, in a like-minded environment. After some planning and fine-tuning, the first Black Food Festival popped up in November 2018 in Budapest, to a huge success. Rwanda joins many international countries after a huge milestone as the first festival debuted in Budapest (November 2018), and received great success and the Berlin, Tel Aviv, Helsinki, New York, Istanbul events followed.