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{
    "id": 132234,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/132234/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 323,
    "type": "other",
    "speaker_name": "",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, from the year 2000 to 2008, the average allocation for the agricultural sector Ministries has been about 4 per cent of the Budget. For a sector that produces 25 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and another 27 with its linkages in manufacturing and other sectors, the kind of sector that employs 80 per cent of all working Kenyans and produces 60 per cent of all our foreign exchange earnings, it is not correct to give such an important sector a budget we have seen over the years. I want to appeal to this House that even as we look at the broad concept of growing this economy so that we can meet the challenges of unemployment and the slow pace of growth, we must and should focus our energies, resources and money on the agricultural sector. We managed to put in place several intervention mechanisms because in the last two years we have experienced a down-turn in the growth of the agricultural sector. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, to mitigate the effects of that downturn and to try and bring back growth in the agricultural sector, which to a great extent will determine what kind of intervention mechanisms--- To be able to encourage farmers to produce and get yields, the Government intervened in reducing the cost of production. Hon. Members will remember that last year, the Government through an intervention by my Ministry and corporations in my Ministry, managed through bulk purchase of fertilizer, to reduce the cost of fertilizers from an average of about Khs6,000 in December 2008 to an average of Kshs2,500 in April this year. I am happy that because of that and the positive effects it has had on farmers, the Government again has taken a further step in the last one week to increase subsidy on farm inputs, especially fertilizer. The same fertilizer now will be sold for Kshs2, 000. It is the same one that used be sold for Kshs2, 500. The CN that used to be sold for Kshs7, 500 will now be sold for Kshs1, 400. We believe that interventions that encourage farmers to produce are necessary if we have to stimulate this economy to grow to the levels envisioned in Vision 2030 by double digits. Last year we managed to buy 67 motor vehicles and 170 motor cycles. Due to the expanded service provision by the Ministry, we managed to reach 700,000 more farmers last year than we did in the previous year. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, in 2008/2009, using extension services through trainings, farmer field days, farmer demonstrations and farmer visits, we managed to reach 2.2 million farmers in 2008 and 2.9 million farmers in 2009. The other avenue and tool that we use to disseminate new technologies is our agricultural training centres. Most of these agricultural training centres were in a state that they could not perform the mandate assigned to them. Last year, we managed to refurbish seven agricultural training centres and we have put some money this year in the budget to refurbish additional agricultural training centres so that farmers can receive more training and access more technology that is being disseminated from the agricultural training centres."
}