HTTP 200 OK
Allow: GET, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept
{
"id": 1490618,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1490618/?format=api",
"text_counter": 112,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Sen. Okiya Omtatah",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": null,
"content": "the country. Perhaps, as we go forward, this will be among the issues that have to be addressed, so that whoever dumps sugar in the country will face dire consequences. We know that some sugar factories are simply created for the purpose of packaging dumped sugar. They hardly have an acre of own cane, nor do they do not have outgrower farmers, but their sugar is all over the shelves. This kind of factories need to be looked into. They need to be addressed, so that they do not become conduits of dumping sugar on the population. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, you have the question of products that come out of cane. Our sugar industry has been held back due to the fact that the only product that we go for is sugar and ethanol. We dump everything else. So, the raw materials that are possible to be extracted from the sugarcane are hardly extracted fully. The farmer needs to benefit from all those byproducts that can be made. We, therefore, need to look at and encourage new technologies to come up, so that this can happen. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, our current factories run mainly obsolete machinery. There might be a need to create a window of opportunity, which can allow our sugar factories to modernize and create a mechanism, through the regulations of enforcing those kinds of requirements, so that efficiencies are realized so that we do not run elaborated sugar factories, which waste most of the crop. I would also like to contribute to the question of taxation in the sugar industry. I would like to repeat and reiterate that if we do not take seriously the question of how much taxes are imposed within the industry, we are going to kill this industry in the name of taxing them. There are many taxes that are imposed on the sugar crop, on inputs and outputs, and all these things go up to frustrate both the miller and the farmer. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, before this Bill came up, we have had the issue of outgrower companies. There is a need to re-look at these outgrower companies, to find out whether they are viable vehicles or not, and if they are viable, how they should be handled. There is a need to look at the assets that these outgrower companies had. For example, in my County, Busia, we have the Busia Outgrower's Company (BOCO), which had assets. When Mumia Sugar Company folded, because they were basically tied by the umbilical cord, BOCO also went under. Of late, I have seen that the new Mumias Sugar Company has been releasing assets of BOCO to an unknown entity. Some tractors have been released. If you go to Busia County, you will find some tractors, which are like ferrying in cane, with the insignia of BOCO on the trailers and tractors, yet, we do not know what kind of arrangement there is. So, with this sugar board coming in, it will be easy to follow up similar issues to those ones to ensure that the bona fides of the people who are put in charge of these public assets are not in doubt and that, the assets of these private bodies are not lost. There is the question of the levies that come through the sugar taxes or levy. These are ring-fenced and some of them go into, for instance, development of roads. There is need to ring-fence them and ensure that these things are kept away from organizations that do not have a good track record of building roads like Kenya Rural Roads Authority (KeRRA). Perhaps, mechanisms that are properly articulated in the The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Director, Hansard and AudioServices, Senate."
}