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"id": 1162240,
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"speaker_name": "Sen. Sakaja",
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"content": "leadership of Kericho, Bomet and Nandi must do is to make sure there is a renegotiation of all of those CBAs to incorporate the current technology that is being used there. That is the current situation on the ground. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, I will table the wage increments on the CBA, which has been above inflation later. On the other side of the debate, when you go to the headquarters of many of these multinationals in London, they do not see Mama Cherotich or Wafula, because there are many people from Western who are doing the tea plucking, they are just seeing a balance sheet, profit and loss. The more these tea factories become unprofitable, the sooner they will pull the plug. There are certain interventions that the Government must do because this a great source of livelihood and employment. Sen. Cherargei wants to be the governor of Nandi County and so, he must listen because these are his people. The first thing, there must be specific direction on the Agricultural Policy and the National Tea Policy to stipulate quality standards and parameters of Kenyan teas which are highly sought after but an element of this mechanisation is reducing the quality. The provisions on The Tea Act, 2020 to enhance value and encourage production of quality, a capacity needs assessment of the tea value chain in Kenya by Kenya Institute of Public Policy Research and Analysis (KIPRA) has been done and that needs to be implemented. There is need to separate the distinctly different sectors, for example, the large growers, smallholder farmers, the Kenya Tea Development Agency (KTDA), the independent producers and respond to each differently. Fiscal policies should minimize taxes. If we do not subsidise this tea factories and companies from the large growers to the small growers, I promise you in the North Rift, Kericho Bomet, Nandi counties, in the next two or three years, there will be a serious breakdown of that society. This is because they moved from Kshs1200 to Kshs6000 for one company. They could probably go to Kshs3000 yet they are occupying large slots of land. I see the side of the people. There is the issue of our export versus sole returns since 2010. We have all of these and we will be tabling it. However, as a bare minimum, before we address the larger interventions by the national Government on the tea sector, we must have a renegotiation of all the CBAs for the companies that have mechanised because the CBAs are about manual plucking. It cannot be the same. It takes a skill and those machines take a toll. They are not simple things it is also lawn mower. It is not a small thing that is pushed around. So, we must renegotiate and we will give our timelines. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, I beg your indulgence. As his Statement is responded to by the Committee on Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries, I will deal with the aspect of the Committee on Labour and Social Welfare in two weeks. We have a retreat in Mombasa next week and my Committee will then bring the full report on James Finlay because that was a direct question that was asked. James Finlay is a good company. In fact, they asked for our intervention when they wanted to do power production towards subsidizing their costs. However, the"
}