Agriculture Cabinet Secretary (CS) Peter Munya has directed tea factories to reduce costs on production so that farmers can get good pay.
Speaking at Itumbe and Ogembo factories in Kisii on Sunday, Munya (pictured above) said that low pay has been majorly contributed by costs of production involved.
The CS decried the high production costs incurred by tea factories that are managed by the Kenya Tea Development Agency (KTDA).
He said this consequently impacts on low returns to farmers.
“The smallholder producers will be required to reengineer their processes in order to cut down on operational inefficiencies and wastage,” he said.
Kenya, through the Ministry of Agriculture and in collaboration with other state agencies will facilitate support for reduction of farm inputs costs and costs associated with storage, transportation logistics and port handling, the CS noted.
“Specifically, my ministry is exploring the possibility of using the Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) as an affordable alternative for transporting tea to the port of Mombasa,” Munya said.
“With regard to storage, we are exploring the possible of existing government storage facilities around the smallholder tea factories.”
He ordered that insurance funds which small tea farmers pay should stop until they stabilize it because it was not helping farmers to cater for medical bills.
Mr Munya said that the government will do a forensic Audit to KTDA and tea factories to see how funds have been used.
The CS said tea factories management together with the Tea Board of Kenya (TBK) and other relevant government agencies, will be expected to urgently address malpractices surrounding the falsification and manipulation of weighing of green leaf at tea buying centers.
This will ensure that farmers derive maximum benefit from their produce.
“We are planningto have digital weighing machines to reduce theft in tea buying centers. But before we reach that decision, those found manipulating figures will face the law,” the CS warned.
Munya decreed that through the tea reforms that were enacted by the national assembly, growers will now have guaranteed minimum returns which began August this year.
He advised county governments to provide extension services to farmers so as to help produce good quality of tea upon capping production costs.
The CS urged farmers to shun politicians with divisive politics and instead elect visionary leaders with the interests of farmers at heart.
The tea reforms agenda engineered by government is geared towards transforming the pricing mechanism through automation of the auction trading platform and whose system has already been implemented.
