New group of Nucleus Counsellors trained in Musanze - Rwanda

More than 20 candidates to nucleus counsellors have been trained in counselling techniques and methodology in Musanze, Rwanda on the first week of april.

Candidates from 5 districts have participated in the training. Supported by Ecoemploi Program. The training has been conducted as a workshop, where all participants have learn by doing. Nucleus Expert Jordi Castan has conducted his 6th training in Rwanda. With more than 140 participants in the six trainings.

Nucleus Rwanda at the EXPO

This year EXPO has had the strong participation of the Nucleus members. Bakers, Video makers, Metalworks, Leatherworks, Photo studios and Fashion designers have been part of the EXPO with a very good preparation, a better participation and good results to show.

See the video Nucleus at Kigali EXPO

The nucleus participation and training has been supported by Ecoemploi program lead by GIZ and in partnership with PSF (Private Sector Federation) technicaly supported by sequa.

Kigali Fashion Designers Nucleus help their members to grow

Working in group helped me to grow

“With the new regulation in place, we had to look for tailors and set up a workshop place, this encouraged us to look for more clients and my turn over increased up to 20%.  Where I was working with 1 staff I have now hired 4 more tailors.”

Patrick Muhire

Inkanda House, belong to one of the growing fashion designer “Patrick Muhire” he was working in isolation and things were tough before joining the Nucleus fashion designer group in 2014, This situation was preventing him from advancing.

“Most of us had that ego of working alone and doing everything by your own, but now, we found out that working together is easier and beneficial to all of us. For example, last year in November 2015, we organized a fashion show and together as a group we got many sponsors, we used the same models to show our creations and all cost were shared.” He says.

With the group, Patrick benefited from capacity building trainings and improved his skills on how to better manage his business. benchmarking visits  were organized to other advanced fashion designers and they set up new regulation of their profession. He testifies that he learned a lot through benchmarking visit such as new ways of organizing a workshop or tissues, he describes the time spend with the nucleus group as beneficial as it helped him to be more creative, motivated and organized.

Inkanda house is now targeting mass production to take advantage of the new policy banning the second hand clothes as a move to promote the locally made products.

Huye District Carpenters share tools to improve their products

Jerome Nsengimana is a carpenter based in Huye District, he has a workshop called” La Verticale”. The lack of modern equipment is also one of their biggest challenges and a great barrier to the development of the carpentry profession. According to him, local        carpenters are able to produce very innovative products if only they can have access to the modern equipment.

This is one of the issues that are being discussed in the nucleus group and as a temporary solution; they are hiring from each other the tools and equipment whenever they need to. This allows members to increase their production as the available resources are shared in a group.

”Before joining nucleus, I used to produce ordinary products, chair, bed or table and I was not getting many clients, but with the group, I gained more knowledge on how to do better designs, with the study tours and   training, I became more innovative. I have new designs and people love them. My productions have increased and so is my turn over up to 40%. I am now able to hire 1 support staff and regularly, I hire 5 temporally people depending on the jobs I get”  He says.

Jerome testifies that being in a group has opened his mind to new possibilities, he is now thinking about expanding and creating more designs. 

Chamber of Art and Crafts Rwanda

A Breakfast meeting with all presidents of the associations members of the Chamber of Art & Crafts has been organized by PSF ( Private Sector Federation) under Ecoemploi Program (GIZ).

Presidents of the Chamber and their associations wanted to know more about how the Nucleus Approach could improve their organisations.

The main question was how to increase the number of members, how to improve services and how to perform better.

Carpenters in Muhanga, Rwanda are improving their business

Finding the appropriate equipment to modernize their production is the main challenge of the carpenters in Rwanda. John TABARO has been a carpenter for 7 years; he lives in Muhanga  District and has a small workshop room   “La Finesse”. He is part of   Nucleus group of carpenters and one of the fast growing members. “Being in a nucleus group have helped me to develop   faster, I got new clients and consequently hired 3 people to support me. I came to believe that when we work together all things are possible” he says

Before joining nucleus group, Tabaro was working alone and the business was running low, the money he was earning served only to cater  for his basic needs. However, things changed when he joined the group, he got training on CEFE and skills on how to better manage his business and went in study tours to  other  carpenters in Gisenyi where he learned new ways of treating wood. also regularly, as a group they visit schools and  hospitals to sensitize people to buy locally made furniture.

Today, Tabaro is a changed man, he is now looking for new  clients across the country, and his production style is changed, modernized and sold in different districts. Where he used to earn 80,000 Rwf per month, he is now earning 300,000 Rwf. He hired 3 employees and temporally, he gives jobs to 2 people.