"The product being launched today is a tangible example of that, and one that we intend to build on for mutual benefit," he said.

Kagame challenged Rwandan companies and young people to take full advantage of this technology and not lose sight of fundamentals, saying it is up to each firm to produce high-quality goods that customers want to buy and to ensure consistent supply.

He noted that Rwandan producers will be able to sell directly to a much larger set of customers than before while bypassing costly intermediaries.

"This improves productivity and profitability. Put differently, there really are no downsides to doing business on a global scale," Kagame said.

He observed that the electronic world trade platform opens up new frontiers in e-commerce and tourism for Rwanda and will also boost the capacity and competitiveness of the country's entrepreneurs and business people.

The Hangzhou-based Alibaba Group runs Taobao online shopping site, and Tmall, a facilitator of online stores.

While in Rwanda in 2017, Jack Ma committed to invest in the East Africa's human capital to boost SME capacities.

He said then that this would include training emerging entrepreneurs across the region to enable small and medium enterprises build e-commerce platforms and using the internet to grow their enterprises.

It would also involve taking about 200 young African investors to his firm's headquarters to learn latest skills in e-commerce, artificial intelligence among other sectors.