Manufacturing contributed 10% to Rwanda's GDP in 1998. The value added by industry dropped 75% in 1994, reflecting the turmoil and massacres of that year. The industrial sector as a whole contributed 20% to GDP in 2000, and the industrial production growth rate in 2001 was 7%.
Most industrial activity centers around food processing. Manufacturing and processing establishments have been at the artisan level, turning out items such as pottery, wicker baskets, bricks, shoes, tile, and insecticide. Rwanda has light industry which produces sugar, coffee, tea, flour, cigars, beer, wine, soft drinks, metal products, and assembled radios. Rwanda also has textile mills, soap factories, auto repair shops, a match factory, a pyrethrum refinery, and plants for producing paint, cement, pharmaceuticals, and furniture. War in 1994 severely disturbed industry. As of 2001, only 40% of pre-war industries had restarted operations. There are abundant natural gas reserves in Lake Kivu, which Rwanda shares with the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Rwanda has expressed interest in explointing those reserves, and in 2000, the country planned to build an inland methane gas plant.