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{
"id": 1379733,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1379733/?format=api",
"text_counter": 129,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Teso South, UDA",
"speaker_title": "Hon. Mary Emaase",
"speaker": null,
"content": " Hon. Temporary Speaker, I rise to move that the Cotton Industry Development Bill (Senate Bill No.5 of 2023) be now read a Second Time. This Bill seeks to provide for the production, processing, marketing and distribution of Cotton and its products in Kenya. The Bill seeks to establish the Cotton Industry Board and provide a framework for cotton farming to ensure value addition to cotton and its related products, and for connected purposes. Hon. Temporary Speaker, before I delve deeper into the contents of the Bill, allow me to present a synopsis of cotton farming in this country to enable Members to better appreciate the intention of the Bill. Cotton farming started in this country way back in 1907. It reached its pick in 1985 when cotton was the main foreign exchange earner for this country. It was a valuable cash crop that sustained many families in the areas where cotton farming was undertaken. I come from the Lake Region, where cotton was one of the main cash crops. I remember picking cotton and seeing it on almost every farm in my neighbourhood. However, today the story is different. In the 1970s and the 1980s, Kenya produced close to 100,000 bales of Cotton annually. This compares very well with our neighbouring countries like Tanzania and Uganda. Uganda produced 400,000 bales of cotton while Tanzania produced 700,000 bales then. That means there is a lot of potential in cotton farming. We used to have millers’ industries like the Kisumu Cotton Millers, famously known as KICOMI then, which used to do the ginning. However, by 2014, we were hardly producing 25,000 bales of cotton. Today, we can hardly produce 7,000 bales, which translate to 3,000 metric tonnes of lint. What happened? Where did the rain start beating us? The collapse of cotton farming in Kenya is blamed on a number of factors, including poor performance of weak farmer organisations, high cost of production, inadequate quality seeds, overreliance on rain-fed production and the middlemen. Currently, there is confusion. Those who have already registered to be cotton farmers, and have started planting cotton, do not know where to take their produce. The ginneries that have been operationalized are very few and sparsely distributed thus increasing the cost of transportation and giving an advantage to middlemen to take over and earn from the sweat of cotton farmers. There is also lack of research and development. The last time this country did any serious research and development on cotton and produced improved seeds was in 1989. During the cotton boom in the 1970s and 1980s, the Government had supported the industry through the Cotton Board of Kenya, which had organised marketing strategies, and farmers were being paid promptly. So, the board actually invested heavily in factories such as Raymond's, RIVATEX as well as KICOMI. We had ginning factories built across the country in Malindi, Kilindini and Kisumu. During that time, there were even experimental farms for research and development in Malindi, Mombasa, Voi and even Kibos in Kisumu. The textile market was liberalised in 1991, after The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor"
}