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: 22 March 2022; Hits: 1590

Kakuzi given green light to export avocado to China

avacado

By George Munene

Kakuzi PLC has secured a permit from the Kenya Health Inspectorate Service (KEPHIS) to process export-grade fresh avocados for the Chinese market.

The move is expected to benefit smallholder farmers supplying avocadoes to the publicly traded company as it will open up China’s mammoth $133 million avocado market.

The approval followed an extensive phytosanitary audit of the firm's farms and packhouses by KEPHIS.

Despite president Kenyatta reaching an MOU with China for the export of avocados in April 2019, Kenyan imports had been barred into the East Asia nation until February this year due to heavy fruit fly infestation.

At the start of the year, the two nations concluded negotiations and put pen to paper on two protocols facilitating bilateral trade focused on avocado and aquatic products export to China.

The trade deal is expected to fast track penetration of agricultural products into the Chinese market and reduce Kenya’s trade deficit with her main trading partner.

China had initially set arduous and costly requirements for Kenyan exporters. They had to freeze the fruits to -30°C, peel off the skin, before further chilling to -18°C for shipping.

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: 21 March 2022; Hits: 987

Nyamira women get indigenous vegetable market through UN program

Mace foods

By George .P. Munene

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) project “AgrInvest - Enabling inclusive and efficient private sector investment in agri-food systems” (AgrInvest-FS), in Kenya is supporting the Nyamira North Women SACCO, a women-led Savings and Credit Cooperative Organization (SACCO) to grow and sell indigenous vegetables to, Mace Foods, a private food enterprise.

Since the partnership was officialized, Nyamira North Women SACCO has delivered 500 kg of products weekly worth Sh1M. Other indigenous vegetables outside the contract valued at Sh220,800 have also been sold to the buyer to plug in shortages by Mace Foods’ usual suppliers.

The UN agency is helping the SACCO establish formal contractual arrangements with the processing company in an effort to unlock sustainable investments in the African indigenous vegetable value chain improving food and nutrition security and creating rural employment.

Mace Foods is an Eldoret-based company that works with over 5,600 contract small-scale farmers sourcing indigenous vegetables and chillis, dehydrates, and packs them for sale for both local and international markets.

The program further seeks to support the SACCO to gather funds to purchase cold storage facilities and through working with the government of Nyamira County seeks to ensure the women employ proper agronomic practices such as timely planting and harvesting as well as pest management.

Other countries targeted by the AgrInvest program include Ethiopia, Burkina Faso, and Niger.

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: 17 March 2022; Hits: 1166

1,000 coffee farmers earn 50% more from direct sales to Korea

coffee exports

By George Munene

About 1,000 coffee farmers from the Kipkelion Coffee Co-operative Society are set to earn Sh103 million from the direct sale of 134.4 metric tons of coffee directly to South Korea.

The graded AA coffee cherry was sold without going through brokers and fetched the farmers Sh116 a kilogram, 56 per cent more than the Sh76 eaned at the Nairobi coffee auction.

“For the first time in Kenya’s history, smallholder coffee farmers have done a complete vertical integration of the coffee value chain, displacing the predatory brokers and other greedy intermediaries who have denied us direct access to the market,” read a statement from the society’s chairperson, Samuel Marindany.

The export deal was arrived at during the Coffee Expo held in Korea's capital Seoul in July last year. The farmers from several coffee cooperatives in Kericho, Bomet, and Nandi counties were able to strike a deal with a South Korean buyer.

A presidential task force appointed in March 2016 reviewed the entire coffee chain and identified areas in its production to marketing that required reforms.

These have led to reforms such as The Coffee Exchange Regulations, 2020 that allow coffee farmers who were previously forced to go through independent brokers.to own brokerage firms and directly sell their cherry.

During the flagging off of seven coffee containers for direct sale to South Africa last month, Kericho Governor Paul Chepkwony pointed out; "The power to earn is now wholly in farmers' hands. The market liberalisation will cushion farmers who labor the most from predatory brokers.”

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