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{
    "id": 386272,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/386272/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 101,
    "type": "other",
    "speaker_name": "",
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I come from a county where agriculture is the core- activity. I wish to mention a very sorry situation here in that, tea is the biggest cash crop that is grown in my county and it has been grown for the last 50 years. I can tell you that with the poverty index that is prevailing in the country at the moment, Bomet County shows a very high poverty index. There is a lot of poverty in Bomet County even though we have this cash crop. This is one of the things that I am sure we will be addressing as we look at the policies on agriculture and try to find out why such a thing should happen to a very high potential area where there are a lot of resources. About 37 per cent to 40 per cent of the earnings from tea disappear in management institutions that deal with tea. For example, the very large bloated organizations of the Kenya Tea Development Agency (KTDA), the Tea Board and the tea research institutions. They consume a lot of these resources that should directly go to the farmer. Secondly, the payments for this product make the farmers poor for a long period of time and then they are paid a certain amount of money as bonuses when they have been suffering for a long time. Prompt payments would be one of the issues that we would like to look at. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, we also want to look at marketing so that we can do our tea blending locally rather than have it in New Jersey in the United States of America. We can do it locally and there are many benefits that will cascade from local blending. We also wish to encourage the Central Government to do research in the tea sector so that we do not only sell black tea but also have an opportunity to sell green tea. This, I am sure we can do. Lastly, I just want to mention something about land. This is an emotive issue and I think this is a scare monger. This is one of the reasons why one of the Commissions that we formed; the Land Reforms Commission, is almost ineffective because it has not been able to perform any visible work because of fear of the fact that land is an emotive issue. I think we should demystify this and be able to deal with land issues in the time of this generation so that other generations do not have to suffer. If we procrastinate on this issue, other challenges will come in. These include the sub-division of agricultural land into small pieces that will not help us. So we should encourage the National Land Commission to overcome the fears of land being an emotive issue and be able to deal with issues of land squarely for the benefit of this country at large. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, in conclusion, power generation should be liberalized. I appreciate this liberalization especially coming from a county where three main rivers coming from the Mau Forest transverse the county. I think we are a county that will be able to generate its own revenue in the next ten years and be able to lend some money to the Central Government. Thank you."
}