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{
    "id": 1134329,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1134329/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 135,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Cherargei",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13217,
        "legal_name": "Cherarkey K Samson",
        "slug": "cherarkey-k-samson"
    },
    "content": "Another issue is that, the additional funds to counties will be very critical. They include bursaries, feeder roads, water and ensuring that Early Childhood Development Education (ECDE) teachers and infrastructure are developed within our counties. My other point is on the agricultural sector. Where we come from, predominantly the North Rift and specifically Nandi County, over 90 percent of the great people of Nandi and mostly the North rift area including your region, rely heavily on agriculture. Therefore, you are aware at the moment, Mr. Speaker Sir, because you also plant maize in your county, that sadly the fertilizer prices have been shooting up astronomically; from Kshs2700 to Kshs5500 per 50 Kilograms of fertilizer. We can see the short rains and we are going to the next planting season. In my county we have sugar cane, tea, maize, and coffee farmers. You can imagine buying a 50 kilograms bag of fertilizer at Ksh5500 from Kshs2700 after the subsidy was removed. I had expected since agriculture is one of the key functions that were devolved, that the issue of national fertilizer subsidy programs should have been included. We are aware the pricing of maize is not as envisaged because we expected the 50-kilogram bag of maize to go up to around Kshs3000 to Kshs3500 as opposed to Kshs2700 we are having at the moment. There is a consistent agenda to undermine agriculture sector as a whole. Agriculture is what most Kenyans in rural areas depend on as a form of economy. It starts with dairy farming in terms of inputs. That is why some other time I heard somebody asking why we are still importing eggs from Uganda. It is because we cannot support our agriculture. The answer is very obvious because you cannot ask the question. In that meeting, Sen. Olekina was in attendance. Somebody was asking why we are importing eggs from Uganda, yet they know very well that they cannot give funds to agriculture. The answer is more than obvious that we need agricultural funding. We saw the issues of tea when the President was talking about post-Covid-19 recovery. Maize was not mentioned anywhere. You cannot blame that we are importing eggs, maize or any other commodity form Uganda. I can see there is a trade war that is coming between Kenya and Uganda because of the imports and the exports here and there. For the agriculture sector, we should really push to ensure that we increase funds. Another danger that is undermining agriculture in this republic it that National government is still doing the functions that have been devolved; like livestock, fisheries, agriculture sector, water and sanitation, irrigation among others. These are some of the things that have already been devolved as per the chapter four of the Constitution of Kenya 2010. The claw back clauses that the national Government continues to use to undermine will not ensure that these functions are devolved. It is very sad. There is a reduction in allocation of agriculture sector from Kshs75.7billion to Kshs63.9billion representing a decrease of 15.6 percent. If you do not allocate more resources to the counties in terms of agriculture sector, it means our people who largely depend on agro economy, within our structures"
}