Posted on August, 10, 2018 at 08:47 am
Opinion
By Evans Kosgei
During my student days at Makerere University, lunch hour was sacred.
While this might be the case for every student, there was something special about the meals in Kampala restaurants.
It was not unusual to find such items on the menu: "All food + beef stew" or "All food + groundnut sauce".
This generic term "all food" referred to the variety of starchy foods -- posho (maize meal), cassava, sweet potatoes, arrowroots and, of course, Uganda's favourite, matoke (plantain).
These foods were abundant; hence, the servings were generous.
BLENDED FLOUR
Across the border, the situation could not be more contrasting.
One of my lecturers, Dr Rukundo, often complained that the Kenyan plate was not colourful enough. It consisted of green and white or, when feeling endowed, green, white and brown.
Dietary diversity relates to nutrient adequacy and variety.
In 2005-6, Uganda's dietary energy supply was 200o kilocalories per capita a day, 79 per cent of it derived from carbohydrates.
In Kenya, it was only 1,800 Kcal/Capita/day, 68 per cent of it carbohydrates.
It is for this reason that I was elated to read of the blended flour initiative (maize flour blended with millet, sorghum, cassava or amaranth) by the Ministry of Agriculture and affiliated organisations.
MAIZE FARMERS
While this is not the silver bullet needed in combating malnutrition -- as claimed by some officials -- it is a step in the right direction.
However, in order to realise the goals of the programme, pivotal queries regarding the dominance of maize in the Kenyan plate have to be asked. How did we get here? How can we change?
Kenya has adopted a protection mechanism regarding maize.
Maize farmers in the North Rift often give a condition to the government to buy their produce at a given price. But they have been a pampered lot since the colonial days.
Concentration on maize by the colonialists began in 1922, when the Bowring Committee recommended production of European maize in order to increase the value of the colony's exports and to provide bulk freight for the railway (rings a bell in regards to SGR?)
ULTIMATUM
Over time, production of the European maize variety "flat white" overtook other cereals, including the African maize, millet and sorghum, even in native reserves farmland.
That was entrenched in the 1940s by the growing demand of food in the Middle East. A fixed price and a minimum return in case of crop failure was given.
This protection, exclusively to maize farmers, gave them the impetus to give ultimatums.
In 1950, maize growers in Trans Nzoia demanded the appointment of "an extra-territorial commission to ascertain the proper price for the 1950 planted maize crop and to advise government on the type of permanent machinery for price ascertainment in future years, which would ensure the removal of this function from the sphere of political and other extraneous influences".
LIBERALISATION
While allowing market forces to play out ensures food security by easing movement of foods from surplus to shortage areas, the colonial and subsequent governments, until early 1990s, viewed the market with suspicion.
This led to restriction of movement of agricultural products in the name of 'territorial self-sufficiency'.
It was not until 1995 when, under pressure from the World Bank through the Structural Adjustments Programmes (SAPs), marketing of maize in Kenya was finally liberalised.
Nonetheless, we still have traces of protectionism with maize being viewed as 'white gold' among traders, producers and consumers.
The spillover effect of this played out in the recent government subsidy of maize flour and the NCPB maize purchase scandal.
BEHAVIOUR CHANGE
For the blended flour initiative to take off, it is imperative that the same focus given to maize be shifted to orphan crops such as millet and sorghum.
We need to relearn other sources of energy and train our palates to accept them -- though that would be an uphill task as urbanites prefer their ugali polished.
Proven social behaviour change strategies should be adopted and sustained before Kenyans accept the new blends.
These strategies should appreciate Kenyan's deep love for ugali as hilariously captured in Padi Wubonn's song "Ugali" (a parody of O. T. Genasis's "Cut It").
If these changes are made, perhaps in the next few years I can invite Dr Rukundo to sample the new Kenyan plate.
Mr Kosgei is a nutritionist at Kenyatta National Hospital.
Source: Daily Nation