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: 12 April 2019; Hits: 5751

Nandi County launches construction of milk processing plant to help farmers with ready market

nandi milk Nandi County Governor, Stephene Sang (second left) during the laucndh of Nandi Cooporative Creameries, a milk processing plant that will help farmers in the region find market for their produce. Photo courtesy.

Nandi county government has today launched construction of Nandi Cooporative Creameries, a first ever milk processing plant in the county that will help dairy farmers in the region access market for their produce.

It is estimated that the farmer owned milk processing factory is worth 300 million. This will mark the end of various challenges that Nandi dairy farmers face including poor milk pricing due to monopoly of other far away processors which source milk from the area.

Farmers have also been lacking cooling facilities which could handle the high quality milk produced in the region.

The county government is already installing milk coolers in all the 30 wards to bulk the milk.

In addition, the government is also preparing the ground before the start of the processing plant in terms of building the capacities of farmers through training, improvement of breeds through artificial insemination and enhancement of animal feeds preservation mechanisms.

The first phase of the plant is expected to be completed later in the year, will consist of cold storage space with loading docks, processing section, utility and west handling facilities, administrative offices and dispatch platform.

The County Coordinating Unit will identify specific wards and farmers’ groups which will be empowered to sustainably take control of their livelihood strategies and with minimal support implement the project.

Apart from investing in the plant itself, farmers will be trained on best practices and offer extension services to ensure that quality of milk produced and processed is of the top most quality.

Already, the construction has created informal employment to over 70 locals and the number is expected to rise as contraction advances.

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: 12 April 2019; Hits: 7167

Youth, women empowerment firm in need of more arrowroot buyers for the produce

arrowroots

ProxyCom limited, an IT company which was originally formed to only offer ICT services but has turned out to empower youth and women through its agribusiness department is currently looking for additional markets for arrowroots, a produce they adopted in 2016 after abandoning sugarcane farming.

The Homa Bay County based company was founded in 2008 by three friends James Odhiambo, Japheth Abudo and Richard Aluoch who are all the firm’s directors. After offering some ICT services from 2009 to 2015 which saw the firm established itself, some youth and women could approach them looking for jobs and handouts making it a big challenge to the trio.

“We therefore thought of something which could accommodate them all and help them earn a leaving as some of them were not well educated and if they did, they were not IT specialist making it difficult for our company to absorb them,” said James Odhiambo, the companydirector in charge of its agribusiness wing.

Beginning 2016, the company begun with some five youth and four women and hired seven acres of land, intercropped sugarcane, maize and beans in five and the remaining two under cereals. After the first season they harvested only three sacks maize worth Sh6,300 which if compared to Sh5000 investment per acre was a devastating.

The company then decided to use the seven acres for cane farming and in 2017 the acreage under the produce was increased from seven to 30 as sugarcane milers in the region were promising good market.

However, this was not to be. After 18 months wait, the period sugarcane take to mature, ProxyCom failed to secure favourable supply contract with the millers something which forced them to try looking for an alternative market by making jaggery (sukari nguru).

“We got an exporter in Nairobi who promised to buy tonnes of jiggery form us and our work was to manufacture the product and transport to him,” said Odhiambo.

But just before the company could start investing in jiggery production, the exporter went missing leaving the farmers stranded with local market options which offer poor prices.

Tired of sugarcane market challenges, the company last year October decided to venture into arrowroots production after hiring 14 acres of land at Sh20,000 each for six years.

They grow the crop organically by use or livestock manure and using ash to control some common arrowroot diseases and balance the soil pH.

“We have realized that most consumers like produce raised organically as they do not have dangerous chemical residues. We have also discovered that there are no large scale arrowroot producers in Kenya as most of the produce come from Rwanda and Uganda,” said Odhiambo.

Today ProxyCom is harvesting 200kg of arrowroots per week. They supply to a company in Nairobi while the rest they sell to open air markets which are not consistent and do not offer good prices.

“The number of youths we work with has increased from the five we started with to 20 while that of women has also risen from four to 17. The effort and passion they have in the arrowroot project after sugarcane challenges has enabled us improve our production and we are looking forward for more buyers,” said Odiambo.

These youth and women are drawn from Dhiwa Sub-county in Homa Bay County and Rongo Sub-county in Migori County.

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: 12 April 2019; Hits: 7065

Isuzu East Africa introduces cold chain logistics vehicles to enable farmers transport perishable produce

Isuzu East Africa (Isuzu EA), a vehicle assembler has introduced their first ever locally assembled Cold Chain logistics vehicles. These will support farmers, hoteliers and a diversity of retailers in transporting temperature-sensitive produce from farms or factories to consumers, following the entire supply chain to preserve their quality.

In collaboration with vehicle accessories suppliers Sai Raj and Specialised Fibre Glass, Isuzu EA has developed cold storage vehicles to mitigate fresh produce losses estimated at between 20to 30 per cent, which occur during transportation from farms to market. The technology harnessed by the partners in the locally assembled vehicles has reduced the costs of purchasing the refrigerated and insulated reefer bodies with savings of Sh300,000 to Sh1,000,000 in some vehicles. Raising the preservation and storage efficiencies of these vehicles will also have a positive impact on producer revenues and profitability.

Speaking at the first interactive forum on Isuzu Cold Chain Solutions, Isuzu EA Sales & Marketing Director, Wanjohi Kangangi, noted that the introduction of the cold storage logistics vehicles supports the Big Four Agenda on Food Security by addressing post-harvest losses faced by farmers and retailers while improving food safety, hygiene and quality.

“We are excited to introduce Isuzu Cold Storage Logistics vehicles that will aid farmers and retailers reduce their post-harvest losses, increase profitability and ensure Kenyans get quality farm produce consistently,” said Kangangi.

“We are confident that our cold chain solution will address the lack of affordable and practical heat insulated trucks which necessitates the adoption of practices such as overnight transport. As a company, we are keen to introduce innovative ways to support government achieve its Big Four agenda for the country,”

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isuzu

Kangangi said that Isuzu EA has provided three types of cold storage vehicles that will meet the needs of perishable retail and farm producers in the country as the company adopts global approaches to resolving temperature-sensitive transport challenges. The vehicles will cater to the unique requirements of horticulture, the meat packing industry and the blue economy.

“High value agricultural produce is generally grown for national and international markets, thus, it is highly dependent on efficient transport. The solutions provided today feature temperature controls ranging from: 5˚C to -5˚C for chilling products such as flowers, milk and meat, -5˚C to -18˚C for preserving products such as seafoods and -18˚C to -30˚C for freezing products such as ice creams. These will help ease the pressure on farmers and suppliers who rely on 3am night temperatures to transport their produce to the market,” added Kangangi.

Kangangi added that retailers and distributors purchasing these vehicles will enjoy other benefits such as increased volume capacity per tonne, global quality packaging standards, fuel efficiency and easier working hours as opposed to late night shifts.

Isuzu EA estimates a potential of 2,000 cold storage vehicle units every year for the local market with payloads of between five to fifteen tonnes.

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