Customs Duties as a Key Function of Rwanda’s Economic Growth Case Study: Gatuna Border in Gicumbi District (2010–2016)

Abstract

The study was about “Customs duties as a key function of Rwanda’s economic growth, Case study of GATUNA Border in Gicumbi District” has the general objective of assessing the impact of customs duties on Rwanda’s Economic growth guided by the following specific objectives: to identify the constraints faced economic growth based on customs duties from Gatuna Border, to analyze the factors influencing customs duties from Gatuna Border to achieve economic growth in Rwanda and to find out the indicators of economic growth in Rwanda via customs duties from Gatuna Border. The hypotheses of the study were: Fraud, Informal cross-border, High level of interest rate and High level of penalties are constraints faced economic growth based on customs duties from Gatuna Border. Type of goods traded, knowledge of the customs union protocol and mode of transportation across the border have the influence influencing customs duties from Gatuna Border to achieve economic growth in Rwanda and Infrastructure development, Increase in PCY, Poverty reduction and Increase in GDP as well as GNP are the indicators of economic growth in Rwanda via customs duties from Gatuna Border. The study was qualitative and quantitative parts as a research design where it used both primary data and secondary data, for data collection techniques the study used interview and documentation techniques. 10 people were considered as the study respondents in interview technique and it referred on the seated data from concerned institutions. E-Views through Microsoft excel was used to estimate simple and multiple regression model by using OLS Method. The major findings of this study revealed that there are different constraints faced economic growth based on customs duties from Gatuna Border where all 10 interviewees equal to 100% of the respondents said that the fraud is one in these constraints and there are factors influencing customs duties to achieve economic growth as R-Square of 0.994 which means 99.4% change in GDP as the measurement of economic growth if the explanatory variables change illustrated and there are different indicators of economic growth in Rwanda through customs duties from Gatuna Border where all 10 interviewees equal to 100% agreed. The study concluded that all the three objectives of this study were achieved and three research questions were answered and help to verify and to confirm all three hypotheses of the study. Finally, the study proposed different recommendations to the concerned people such as international traders, government and future researchers.