Farmers push a handcart perched with fertiliser at Giakaibei Village in Mathira. [ Kibata Kihu, Standard]
Government fertiliser, seed subsidies and cooperation between State Department for Agriculture and devolved governments are turning around prospects of the country’s food security and general food production.
Learning from trends in Malawi that bumped in huge food productions between 2002 and 2004 new policy directions by the State Department of Agriculture have helped jumpstart Kenya’s food security which had deteriorated to threatening levels by end of 2022.
The cost of maize flour, a staple food in Kenya, had skyrocketed beyond reach, and majority could not afford 2 kilo packet at Sh230. The interventions by the government over the past two years have brought back Bomet County for example to the league of the country’s bread baskets after declining in maize production for over 10 years due to a consistent outbreak of Maize Lethal Necrosis (MLN).
Bomet had plummeted to the knee in maize production, but a refocused energy has restored the county’s food sufficiency.
