Rwanda remains one of the poorest countries in the world with poverty concentrated in rural areas where over 70 per cent of the population live. In 2006 90 per cent of poor people in Rwanda lived in rural areas and just over 60 per cent of the rural population were poor.
Fighting extreme poverty and hunger as envisioned in the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and the Government of Rwanda’s socioeconomic development agenda will be greatly affected by poor health, especially in rural areas.