03-18-2020 ■ Prosper Ngendanganya, Director of Supervision, Financial Stability and Inclusion at Burundi Central Bank –BRB says the decision has been taken to supervise all movement of foreign currency exchange in Burundi. “All foreign instant transfers including operations done through Western union and MoneyGram will be operated in Burundian francs,” he (...)

03-13-2020 ■ Commercial activities between Rugombo commune in Cibitoke province and Luvungi city in the DRC were suspended over a week. Traders from both localities plead for their resumption. All trade activities have been suspended on Rubenga border between Rugombo commune and Luvungi city in Uvira province of South Kivu in (...)

03-10-2020 ■ Jean Marie Niyokindi, Minister of Trade, Industry and Tourism said sugar wholesalers are involved in the sugar shortage that has occurred in Bujumbura city these days. “Wholesalers hide sugar instead of distributing it to retailers,” he said adding that the latter then speculate about its price. The Minister also (...)

02-21-2020 ■ “The price of cherry coffee A has increased from BIF 500 to BIF 550 per Kg while cherry coffee B increases from BIF 250 to BIF 275 per Kg “said Déo Guide Rurema, Minister of the Environment, Agriculture and Livestock, at the official launch of the 2020-2021 Coffee Campaign. (...)

02-20-2020 ■ “We would like to warn speculative traders about stealing food production in order to sell it at an exorbitant price in neighboring countries”, said Déo-Guide Rurema, Minister of Agriculture at a press conference on the production of the season crop A held on 19 February. He said the ministry (...)

02-18-2020 ■ All currency exchange offices have been closed since February 15 following the measure taken on 11 February by Jean Ciza, Governor of Burundi Central Bank. He accuses foreign exchange dealers of violating the current currency exchange regulations. Only commercial banks are allowed to deal with foreign currencies. This measure (...)

02-13-2020 ■ Gabriel Rufyiri, Chairman of a corruption watchdog-OLUCOME says the decision taken by the Burundi Central Bank-BRB doesn’t provide any solution to the problem of the lack of foreign currencies in Burundi. He says the country faces a major challenge since financial partners reduced their support to the government in (...)

02-12-2020 ■ Jean Prosper Niyoboke, expert in economy says the decision taken by Burundi Central Bank to close all foreign currency offices will have no impact on the Burundian economy if the government is ready to supply enough foreign currencies as the forex offices did to satisfy their clients. “The exchange (...)

02-11-2020 ■ Jean Ciza, Governor of Burundi Central Bank says foreign currency exchange offices didn’t respect the rules set for foreign exchange rate. “The foreign currency dealers bought dollars but they rarely supplied them to the clients,” says Mr. Ciza. He also says foreign currency dealers didn’t use BUREX, the software (...)

02-07-2020 ■ Some foreign currency dealers have temporarily suspended their daily activities in Bujumbura city. H.M, one of the exchange dealers says the demand of foreign currency is very low these days. “Our clients only look for BIF,” he says. Diomède Nduwayo, another dealer says the cost of the dollar has (...)