Rwanda has found a new partner to promote Visit Rwanda.
English football club Aston Villa, which currently plays in the English Premier League, announced on Tuesday that it will work with Rwanda to promote the country's tourism through the Visit Rwanda program.
The agreement signed between the club and Rwanda stipulates that the Visit Rwanda logo will appear on the front of the shirts worn by the players of the men's, women's and youth teams of the club, as well as on materials that may be used by the club for advertising purposes.
Aston Villa becomes the second English club to partner with Visit Rwanda, after the previous partnership between Rwanda and Arsenal ends on June 30, 2026 after eight years.
"This is a great partnership for Aston Villa Football Club, and a sign of our continued growth and expansion into the international market," said Aston Villa's Chief Commercial Operations Officer Francesco Calvo after the announcement of the partnership.
“We see many opportunities that will come from this partnership, including learning, innovation, and we are ready to work closely with Visit Rwanda to showcase clear initiatives for tourism, investment, and sports development,” he added.
Visit Rwanda replaces the betting company Betano, which was used by Aston Villa on the players' shirts.
After eight consecutive years of Rwanda partnering with Arsenal on the Visit Rwanda initiative, the CEO of the Rwanda Convention Bureau (RCB) Janet Karemera, said that Rwanda’s new partnership with Aston Villa reflects Rwanda’s commitment to continue working with British clubs, as the country is one of the top tourist destinations in Rwanda.
“We are ready to work with Aston Villa to reach out to a wider audience in the UK, Europe and around the world. Through this partnership, we aim to strengthen our connections with those who want to visit Rwanda, such as tourists, investors or those who want to develop football in Rwanda in the long term,” Karemera said.
“This partnership is a true Rwandan way of reaching out to more people through some of their most common platforms, in order to demonstrate that our country is a great place to visit, invest and do business,” Karemera added.
In addition to the fact that Aston Villa will be using the Visit Rwanda logo on all of its team's home players’ shirts, it is expected that this partnership will promote Rwanda as a good destination for tourism, investment, business, conferences and other international events, as well as sports.
In addition to that, both sides will also collaborate on other activities including promoting football, training football coaches, projects to develop communities and charitable programs, projects to promote good leadership especially among youth, and other development-oriented projects.
