The Kwita Izina is Rwanda's annual gorilla naming ceremony, revived in 2005 after the genocide had decimated both the country's mountain gorilla conservation programs and the tourism infrastructure that funded them. The ceremony takes its name from a traditional Rwandan practice of naming newborn gorillas, which biologists working in the Virunga Massif had themselves adopted decades earlier. By 2010, when this coin was issued, the ceremony had become a significant international conservation event drawing foreign dignitaries and press attention to a country otherwise still rebuilding its international image.
Rwanda's numismatic output in this period leaned heavily on wildlife themes aimed squarely at the collector market rather than circulation.
The Kwita Izina is Rwanda's annual gorilla naming ceremony, revived in 2005 after the genocide had decimated both the country's mountain gorilla conservation programs and the tourism infrastructure that funded them. The ceremony takes its name from a traditional Rwandan practice of naming newborn gorillas, which biologists working in the Virunga Massif had themselves adopted decades earlier. By 2010, when this coin was issued, the ceremony had become a significant international conservation event drawing foreign dignitaries and press attention to a country otherwise still rebuilding its international image.
Rwanda's numismatic output in this period leaned heavily on wildlife themes aimed squarely at the collector market rather than circulation.