Rwanda funds competitive research and innovation grants through the National Research and Innovation Fund (NRIF), which is administered by the National Council for Science and Technology (NCST) — not, despite the similar-sounding acronym, the same body as Kenya’s differently-named National Commission for Science, Technology and Innovation (NACOSTI). Several African countries have a science-council body that gets shortened to some variant of “NCST” or “NACOSTI” in casual usage; this guide covers Rwanda’s specifically, and disambiguates it from Kenya’s near-neighbor at the end.
What Is Rwanda’s NCST, and What Is the NRIF?
Rwanda’s National Council for Science and Technology (NCST) is a public institution established by Law No 40 of 16 August 2017, which also assigns NCST the mandate of managing the National Research and Innovation Fund (NRIF). NCST sits within Rwanda’s science, technology and innovation (STI) governance structure as the body responsible for operationalizing national research funding — distinct from ministries that set STI policy at a higher level.
NRIF itself was launched as an operational funding mechanism in June 2018. Its stated purpose is to promote national research and innovation capacity, performance, and productivity by funding research and innovation activities aligned with Rwanda’s development priorities, with the explicit goal of translating research output into economic and societal impact rather than funding research for its own sake.
Priority Research Areas
NRIF funding is targeted, not open-ended: proposals are expected to align with priority areas set out in Rwanda’s National Research and Innovation Agenda (NRIA). Based on NCST’s own published program descriptions, those priority areas include:
- Sustainable Energy
- Food Security and Modern Agriculture
- Life and Health Sciences
- Local Production and Value Addition
- Digital Services, Products, and Lifestyle
- Resilient Environment and Natural Resources
Researchers and institutions preparing a proposal should confirm current priority-area wording and any per-cycle emphasis directly against the live call documents on NCST’s site (ncst.gov.rw), since specific calls can narrow or reweight these areas from cycle to cycle.
NRIF Funding Schemes
NCST has run several distinct grant schemes under the NRIF umbrella. The names, structure, and funding envelopes below reflect NCST’s own published calls and concept notes; because eligibility windows and funding ceilings can change between cycles, treat the figures as illustrative of the mechanism’s scale rather than a standing, always-current rate card — confirm against the specific open call before budgeting a proposal.
Rwanda Innovation Challenges for Academia-Industry R&D Collaboration Grant (RIC-R&D)
RIC-R&D is NRIF’s flagship applied-research mechanism, designed to support academia-industry partnerships that move research toward commercialization or technology absorption. It is co-funded through NRIF together with industry/private-sector partners, who are expected to contribute at least an additional 20% of resources to the project. The scheme runs in two phases:
- Phase I — up to 90 million RWF, for a 12–18 month project developing, testing, and validating an R&D idea with commercialization or technology-absorption potential.
- Phase II — between 300–500 million RWF, for up to 60 months (5 years), available to projects that have already demonstrated proof of concept in Phase I and are scaling toward market or field deployment.
Eligibility for RIC-R&D calls has required the Principal Investigator to be a Rwandan scientist holding at least a Master’s degree (PhD preferred), partnered with at least one internationally recognized expert in the relevant field — a structure intended to combine local leadership with external technical credibility.
Research and Innovation Mobility Grant
NCST has also issued calls for a Research and Innovation Mobility Grant, intended to support researcher mobility (for example, exchange, collaborative visits, or joint work between Rwandan researchers and partner institutions) as a complement to the project-based schemes above. As with RIC-R&D, exact eligibility and funding parameters are set per call.
Excellent Research Grant and Open Access APC Support
NCST has periodically run an Excellent Research Grant call and, separately, a scheme supporting payment of Open Access Article Processing Charges (APCs) for Rwandan researchers publishing in open-access venues — a narrower but practically useful mechanism for institutions trying to manage open-access publishing costs. Both have appeared as standalone calls on NCST’s site rather than as permanently open, rolling programs.
How to Apply: RIGMS
NCST manages research and innovation grant applications through the Research and Innovation Grant Management System (RIGMS), an online platform (rigms.ncst.gov.rw) used for submission and administration of NRIF-funded calls. As with the funding schemes themselves, applicants should treat NCST’s own site and RIGMS portal as the authoritative source for which calls are currently open, since NRIF operates through discrete, dated calls for proposals rather than a single standing rolling-application window.
Rwanda’s NCST vs. Kenya’s NACOSTI: Don’t Confuse the Two
Because several African science-granting councils use overlapping naming conventions, it is worth being explicit: Rwanda’s National Council for Science and Technology (NCST), which administers the NRIF, is a completely separate institution from Kenya’s National Commission for Science, Technology and Innovation (NACOSTI), which performs research permitting/clearance functions in Kenya and is a different body from Kenya’s National Research Fund (NRF), Kenya’s own competitive research-funding council. See CASRAI’s guide to Kenya’s National Research Fund (NRF) for the Kenyan equivalent of a national competitive research-funding body. Researchers and administrators working across East Africa should not assume that funding rules, eligibility, or application platforms transfer between these bodies just because their names sound alike — each operates under its own enabling law, governance structure, and grant-management system.
For comparable national science-granting council structures elsewhere in East and Southern Africa, see CASRAI’s guides to Uganda’s UNCST and its NRIMS grant platform and Zambia’s NSTC and National Research Fund. Institutions building a pan-African funding strategy may also want CASRAI’s overview of Mastercard Foundation institutional funding in Africa, and, for the regulatory side of multi-country African clinical research specifically, the guide to the African Medicines Agency (headquartered in Kigali, Rwanda, but a distinct body from NCST/NRIF with a regulatory rather than research-funding mandate).
Practical Guidance for Research Administrators
- Confirm you’re looking at Rwanda’s NCST, not another country’s science council. Search results and secondary summaries frequently conflate “NCST” and “NACOSTI” across countries; verify against ncst.gov.rw directly.
- Treat NRIF as call-based, not a standing fund you can apply to any time. Each scheme (RIC-R&D, mobility grants, Excellent Research Grant, APC support) has appeared as a dated call with its own deadline and eligibility window, not a rolling open application.
- Budget for co-funding on RIC-R&D. The industry-collaboration structure requires at least 20% additional resources from the private-sector partner, so proposal budgets need a credible industry co-funding commitment, not just the NRIF request.
- Plan around the two-phase RIC-R&D structure. Phase I (up to 90 million RWF, 12–18 months) is explicitly a proof-of-concept stage; Phase II (300–500 million RWF, up to 5 years) is reserved for projects that already cleared that bar, so a Phase I proposal should be scoped and budgeted as a discrete, self-contained milestone rather than assuming automatic progression to Phase II funding.
- Use RIGMS for submission status, not just discovery. Once a call is open, RIGMS (rigms.ncst.gov.rw) is the system of record for submission and administration — confirm account setup and document requirements there well ahead of any deadline.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Rwanda’s National Research and Innovation Fund (NRIF)?
NRIF is Rwanda’s national competitive research and innovation funding mechanism, administered by the National Council for Science and Technology (NCST) under Law No 40 of 16 August 2017. It was operationalized in June 2018 and funds research and innovation activities aligned with Rwanda’s National Research and Innovation Agenda.
What priority areas does NRIF fund?
NCST’s published priority areas are sustainable energy, food security and modern agriculture, life and health sciences, local production and value addition, digital services/products/lifestyle, and resilient environment and natural resources — drawn from Rwanda’s National Research and Innovation Agenda.
What is the Rwanda Innovation Challenges (RIC-R&D) grant?
RIC-R&D is NRIF’s academia-industry collaboration grant scheme, co-funded with private-sector partners contributing at least 20% additional resources. It runs in two phases: Phase I (up to 90 million RWF, 12–18 months) for proof-of-concept work, and Phase II (300–500 million RWF, up to 60 months) for scaling projects that already demonstrated proof of concept.
Is Rwanda’s NCST the same as Kenya’s NACOSTI?
No. Rwanda’s National Council for Science and Technology (NCST) administers Rwanda’s NRIF research-funding mechanism. Kenya’s National Commission for Science, Technology and Innovation (NACOSTI) is a separate institution in a different country, performing research permitting/clearance functions; Kenya’s competitive research funding is instead administered by Kenya’s National Research Fund (NRF). Do not assume the two are the same body or that processes transfer between them.
How do researchers apply for NRIF funding?
Applications are submitted through NCST’s Research and Innovation Grant Management System (RIGMS), an online platform used for both submission and administration of NRIF-funded calls. Because NRIF funds through discrete, dated calls rather than a standing rolling window, applicants should monitor ncst.gov.rw directly for currently open calls.
