The Rwanda Technology Development Agency (RICTA) encourages Rwandans, especially self-employed people, to change their mindset and use social media sites with names based on Rwanda’s website, including AkadomoRw.[.RW]
It is a way to promote Rwanda and encourage Rwandans to keep their information inside the country by improving its good image.
It is one of the most reliable strategies to promote Rwandan business and activities in the region, Africa and the world in general.
Statistics show that only about 6,500 companies are using the .rw domain and they are mostly government and related companies.
According to RICTA, the majority of people in Rwanda use websites that include .fr, .com, .org, which makes it difficult to manage information security and cost a lot of money to pay abroad.
Ingabire Grace, Director General of RICTA, says that Rwanda is going bankrupt because of companies that are still using internet site names that do not end with a dot r.
He says that more than 5000 companies in Rwanda use .com, .org, .net where they are facing security problems, even though the information is deleted by the controllers of these websites.
He said, “We want all those people to come and use .Rw, as we find that we are promoting Made in Rwanda, but we want to go beyond the 5,000 and go to other companies that use Gmail, Yahoo, because there are also many in Rwanda.”
Ingabire raised the issue of those who have the perception that .Com users are international, requesting that while big companies in Rwanda and small ones use .rw, they would promote this website in a short time.
He said, “If you are a businessman who uses .rw on the internet, it is obvious that you are from Rwanda, which is a source of pride for Rwandans.”
James Karamuzi, an employee of the Ministry of Technology and Innovation says that people who do not understand that .rw goes beyond the borders of Rwanda do not understand that it is safe for their products and to promote them on the international market.
He said, “Rwandans should obey .rw, those who use others should change this to Made in Rwanda, it is ours.”
Users of dotRw, say that the security related to what they put on their social networks is very reliable, due to the effort that the government puts in compared to other users.
Currently, users of .rw pay 12 thousand Rwandan francs per year while users of .com, .org, .fr pay between 10$ and 20$.
