The study examined the contribution of youth self-employment and socio-economic transformation in Rwanda specifically in Rwezamenyo sector. The specific objectives were to examine the youth self- employment practices in Rwezamenyo Sector, to analyse the influence of youth self-employment on socio-economic transformation in Rwezamenyo Sector and to assess the challenges that affect youth self-employment in Rwezamenyo Sector. The data were collected using questionnaire, and documentation techniques. Results were collected from 260 self-employed youth and the data were analyzed using descriptive statistics. The results show that the surveyed youth are involved in different self-employment domains such as in trading (48%), handcraft (8%), production (14), service sector (19%) among others and 64% are proud of their self-employment status. It was also proved that the youth self-employment exerts a great contribution to the rise of socio-economic transformation as indicated by the correlation coefficient of 0.771 implying a strong positive correlation between youth self-employment and socio-economic transformation. it revealed self-employment enables the youth to earn a living, increases income, helps to expand their business and cater for all their family needs as indicated by maximum mean score as computed by the system (>4). It was proved youth self-employment impacts on socio-economic transformation by contributing to job creation, improvement of socio-economic status, reduction of unemployment rate and increase in the government revenues. The study also highlighted the key challenges that affect youth self-employment in Rwezamenyo sector. The results show that 44% of the respondents agreed that lack of start-up capital is one of the challenges to youth self-employment practices. Secondly 15% of the youth cite the issue unfavourable working environment such as competition with big entrepreneurs, market conditions, among others. Moreover, it was also revealed that 9% of the respondents cite the lack of training while other 6% cite lack of commitment and creativity. 

Key words: Youth, self-employment, socio-economic transformation