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{
    "id": 244544,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/244544/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 115,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Prof. Anyang-Nyong'o",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 193,
        "legal_name": "Peter Anyang' Nyong'o",
        "slug": "peter-nyongo"
    },
    "content": "Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I would like to second the amendment. What Mr. Syongo has proposed will supplement what the Mover of the Motion has proposed. It will also take into account all the able contributions that have been made by various hon. Members. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the demand for nuts globally, especially cashewnuts, macadamia nuts and groundnuts has increased tremendously. The world has realised that blending various nuts to make vegetable oil industrially is not only healthy, but responds to environmental and health demands in the world today. What the Government needs to understand is that industrialisation of this country cannot really take place unless agriculture is industrialised. What I mean is that, quite often, we talk about value-addition in agriculture, without going into the details of how that value-addition is going to take place. Value-addition actually means that agricultural material, in order to earn more value to the farmers, must enter an industrial processing system. It means that when a raw material is sold, it is not sold as raw material. It is sold as a second generation transformed raw material, which is an industrial product. The mixing of those nuts is not for purposes of eating only, but for making oil. For example, when you board a Kenya Airways flight, you are given those mixed nuts. They are, basically, cashew nuts, macadamia nuts and groundnuts. Apart from that, there are very many medicines today, that are derived from nuts. Sugar-cane too, is a raw material for making medicine. If you go to Cuba, you will find that July 5, 2006 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 1821 Cubans have specialised in making all kinds of industrial products from sugar-cane. We, too, could do the same with all kinds of agricultural raw materials that we have, including nuts. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, therefore, when we establish a Kenya Nuts Development Authority, it will not only make it possible for us to do research into nuts development and production, but it will also help us to develop a market for our nuts products. At the moment, the Ministry of Agriculture, under various regional development authorities, does not seem to realise that we are sitting on a gold mine. Globally, the price of cashew nuts and macadamia nuts is very high; just like the price of vanilla. In actual fact, our farmers could substitute the low quality agricultural products they are currently growing with nuts and vanilla. Macadamia nuts and groundnuts grow very well in Nyanza. Macadamia nuts and cashew nuts can grow very well in coastal and western regions. We have certain ecological and regional zones where the speciality in growing nuts could be very rewarding. I know that in Eastern Province and, in particular, Ukambani, macadamia can do very well. If we intensify the growing of certain nuts in certain regions, and then blend them at a central point industrially to produce not just nuts for eating but also oils, we shall do very well. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, finally, in support of this amendment, we will need economies of scale to deal with the problem of nut development centrally, rather than deal with each nut separately. You all understand that we used to have a cereals board. We used to have centres for doing research on all the cereals. But the development of cereals has also been hampered simply because the research on cereals has been demarcated into various cereal groups like maize, rice and so on. We can achieve much more through the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARI), if it took it upon itself to support us in developing knowledge about the need to do better research in nuts. This House will do this country a lot of good by supporting this amendment. That will also encourage farmers to invest in the industrial production of oils. So, the establishment of a Kenya Nuts Development Authority will go a long way in developing nuts as one major product in our country that will lead to better rewards. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, we do not seem to devote sufficient amounts of money in this Parliament for research purposes. We do not seem to place a lot of emphasis on scholarships and bursaries for agriculture students who are going to specialize in certain fields of our agriculture. In other countries, students in polytechnics and universities are given vocations to work specifically in industries belonging to the government. They are given long periods to develop specialised knowledge in those areas. A student who has a Bachelor of Science Degree in Agriculture and works generally in too many fields cannot help this country. That is the bone that I want to pick with KARI. KARI does not seem to have targeted specialisation in certain detailed areas in agricultural research which will make a difference. Since we had a few cash crops like coffee, tea and sugar-cane, we have gone a long way to have specialities in those areas. We excluded other crops which, now, have much more potential for this country than the traditional cash crops that we have over-specialised in. Therefore, when that Authority is established, it should have a research department that goes beyond what KARI is doing. It should go up to the polytechnics and universities and sponsor students who are specialising in research in those areas. The discovery of new oil varieties will depend on the kind of research that we do. At the moment, we are consumers of research products from outside. For example, we do not know how Elianto was developed. We go to supermarkets and buy many of those oils. Certain research institutes abroad have patented them and, therefore, when you are buying the oil, you are not just paying for the oil, but for the patent that originally produced that oil. Our country can make a lot of money by doing research in some of those areas and patenting it. I am certain that there is a variety of coffee that was developed here in Ruiru. A number of years ago, the Vietnamese came here and bought it from us. I understand that it was sold by one of our researchers who was discontented because he 1822 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES July 5, 2006 was dismissed unceremoniously from Ruiru. Therefore, he went and sold the research results to the Vietnamese. Today, the Vietnamese are producing more coffee than Kenya. They are becoming very dominant in coffee export the world over, simply because one of our scientist sold \"Ruiru 11\" to the Vietnamese. That product of Kenyan scientific research has benefited another third world country. I am not against Kenya benefiting from other third world countries. But if we had maintained that patent, the Vietnamese could be paying us for every ounce of coffee that they export in the world market. We would be earning from our intellectual property for having done research in coffee. The area of nuts and oil has so much potential that if we go the way that Mr. Syongo and Mr. Khamisi are saying today, we will go a long way in making a tremendous mark internationally in having ventured into the vegetable oil industry. We have the ingredients that may lead us to produce an oil variety in our market, so that rather than buy Elianto oil which we are buying very religiously, we will have oil produced in Kenya which is healthy and is based on non-genetically modified food. It will be natural food from Kenya because these three plants grow so extensively in this country, that we do not need to modify them in any way to get the right quantities for our industries. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I can see that Capt. Nakitare has a Motion on genetically-modified food which is coming to the House. I have a lot of reservations about this---"
}