E-tractors change fortunes of Rwanda's smallholder farmers

In Gashora, a small village located about an hour’s drive away from Kigali in Rwanda’s Eastern Province, sits an establishment whose agricultural technology pilot project could change the country’s smallholder farmers’ fortunes for good.

GenFarm Project, an initiative of Volkswagen Mobility Solutions Rwanda and the Rwanda Institute for Conservation Agriculture (RICA), is in top gear, seven months after its official launch.

The sight of four majestic white tractors, parked outside a makeshift establishment, which is part of a multifunctional, holistic facility that now sprouts out of the middle of farmland, greets us when we get there; they look sleeker than tractors should.

They are not just any tractors, perhaps the reason why, at a closer inspection, they seem to lack the exaggerated sophistication that many expect to see on them, with cumbersome engines coughing up smoke from the front; these are electric-powered tractors.

The four tractors are part of many others that will be deployed in the future, hired or sold to farmers, in what proprietors of the facility believe will be a life-changer for locals, and to Rwanda’s agricultural landscape.

At this time of the year, the farms do not seem to have much to offer. There is isolated greenery, but the ground is charred under the unforgiving sun.

A good number of the farms are underutilised or unutilised altogether. If that remains unchanged, then the region, and Rwanda by extension, could soon feel the sting.

About 83 per cent of Rwanda’s agricultural production comes from smallholder farmers, with over 60 per cent of Rwandan soil suitable for agriculture, as the soils are fertile.  

In introducing these cutting-edge electric tractors to rural farmers, the GenFarm Project is empowering them with more efficient, sustainable, and eco-friendly farming solutions.

This is expected to increase productivity, reduce manual labour, and improve overall farming efficiency while promoting sustainability through reducing carbon emissions.

Within the facility are charging units where massive batteries, each of about 400kgs, are plugged in, after which they are slid out and slotted into the tractors mechanically, but with little hassle.

“The tractors run on 38kWh batteries, and these batteries can last for up to a hectare of land. It takes three hours to fully charge them,” says Jean Paul Sibomana, the GenFarm Project coordinator. While the facility is connected to the national power grid, work is ongoing in the backyard to lay out an array of solar panels, which will power all the operations within the facility.

Launched in October 2024, the facility has created more than 50 jobs, with the tractors already exciting farmers in the region.

Within a few months of the launch, there was demand to farm over 80 acres within the area, which the company was unable to meet at the time.

It is out of this realisation that the company now intends to ramp up capacity while making necessary improvements to the technology, including faster and in-situ replacement of the batteries.

The facility has been described as “a holistic ecosystem of e-powered mechanised farming” as it intends to build facilities that will support the entire agricultural production value chain, including offering cold storage to prevent post-harvest losses.  

GenFarm is able to offer lower tillage costs to farmers compared to conventional diesel-powered tractors, and Mr Sibomana says that they have a competitive edge to cement their place in the market.

“To inspire confidence among the farmers, we are also able to follow up with our tractor drivers, ensuring that the work done is of the best quality,” he says.

Volkswagen’s Holger Lange says this is an important point in history as these low-cost, environmentally-friendly tractors will make a lot of idle land profitable, improving livelihoods.

“It is rather new technology that we are improving on with time. The battery technology took a bit longer to develop to this extent, but we are happy we can now deploy,” he says.