Posted on November, 14, 2018 at 09:14 am
By MATHEWS NDANYI
Nandi Hills MP Alfred Keter and his Moiben counterpart Sila Tiren will host a meeting for farmers in Eldoret on Saturday to discuss the maize price crisis, purchase of subsidized fertilizer among other issues.
This comes as the government ordered the NCPB to decentralize its operations to rural areas where it will directly deal with farmers in the purchase of maize and distribution of fertilizer.
Operations Manager of the board Cornelius Ngelechei said they would comply with the directive from CS for Agriculture Mwangi Kiunjuri to open up more than 15 rural buying centers in Uasin Gishu, Trans Nzoia and Nandi among other high producing areas.
“We will move our services and operations closer to the farmers so that we help them easily access NCPB”, said Ngelechei.
Kiunjuri who completed a tour of the NCPB stores in North Rift said the decentralization would help to deal with cartels which have been taking advantage of farmers to control the NCPB.
“The board should have computerized systems at the buying centers so that we do not again ghet into the situation we have faced this year”, said Kiujuri.
Director of the Kenya Farmers Association Kipkorir Menjo confirmed that the MPs would attend the farmers meeting in Eldoret.
“We will meet with the MPs so that we join hands in pushing for our agenda including better prices for maize and cheaper farm inputs like fertilizer”, said Menjo.
Tiren on Monday asked Kiunjuri to deal with the crisis facing maize farmers urgently.
“On issues like price of maize we wonder why it’s easy to set prices for importation of maize but when it comes to farmers we have to be subjected to scientific research and other conditions”, said Tiren.
He said they would meet farmers and chart a new way forward if the government does not quickly deal with the price issue and how the NCPB will purchase maize from farmers.
The board has planned to buy more than 800,000 bags of maize from farmers in Uasin Gishu alone.
On Monday Kiunjuri said the government has deployed experts to inspect the 3.5 million bags of maize stored by the NCPB and establish whether it is safe to eat.
A report by the Kenya Bureau of Standards had indicated that some maize might not be fit for consumption. In September, Trade CS Peter Munya and Kebs told the committee that maize worth Sh8.05 billion was yellowing after overstaying in the silos.
Kiunjuri said the experts will work in five teams and give their reports on Friday.
They include officers from the Public Health department, the National Cereals and Produce Board, Kenya Bureau of Standards and the Kenya Plant Health Inspectorate Service.
Source: The Star