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"id": 508194,
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"content": "all and given the perishable nature of the potatoes, the farmers have no choice. The farmers end up agreeing to sell their potatoes at any price. Much as the maize farmers may complain about bad prices, they can keep their crop for sometime while they wait for better prices. However, this is not the case with potatoes. If they were harvested in Nyandarua yesterday, by this evening, they are already on our plates. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, there are very few industries which will buy potatoes specifically by weight because of their nature. Therefore, there is no processing yet. If we are to go through what is suggested in this Bill, perhaps some inducement of processing will happen. Due to that awkwardness of not knowing at which weight a farmer should sell his potatoes, when we say “five or ten bags,” it has no meaning. The Government tried to set some regulations in 2005 through Legal Notice No.44, where the weight was set at 110 kilogrammes. However, it ended up just being a cat and mouse game between the farmers and transporters on one hand and the police on the other hand. The police will just ask for a kickback and allow bags with the wrong weight to pass. This has happened over the years. As a result, the farmers are now back to square one. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, recently, the Government announced that the standard weight will be 50 kilogrammes, not only for potatoes, but a whole range of other farm produce. The problem with potatoes and other similar products is that whereas you set the weight at 90 kilogrammes, there are big players who can either manufacture or organize to get bags to carry different weights. No one manufactures 50-kilogramme bags to carry potatoes. Therefore, although the Government announced these standard weights some three or so weeks ago, you will not find a 50-kilogramme bag anywhere in the country. Unless there is somebody from a Government department or body like the one that we are proposing in the Bill, to organize this packaging, not much will change. None of the farmers know what to do, much as the Government has set the weight at 50 kilogrammes, because there is no such bag. On the other hand, the same law which the Government quoted to fix the weight also set a Kshs500 fine if you do not comply. The end result is that you do what you can and play a cat and mouse game with the police. It is just a new cash-cow for the police. If you go to Marikiti Market today, you will find that all the “dusuras” which were there before are the same. There is nobody from the Government to confirm the weights announced. Therefore, we need to have some regulatory body. The standard weight is just one item. The next one is the standard of the product itself. At the moment, we do not have any standard at all. We have got eight or ten different varieties of potatoes. But because of lack of a regulatory body, you cannot tell which standard you are dealing with. As a result of that, we, as a country, have completely shut off ourselves from the export market which is very strict on standards. The other problem is the yield per acre or hectare. Today in Kenya, the average production is around ten tonnes per hectare, which is about 30 bags or so. However, if you compare with other countries, Netherlands, for example, at the moment it is at 45 tonnes per hectare. This is roughly 120 bags. New Zealand is producing about 70 tonnes per hectare, which is close to 200 bags. Even Egypt which is a desert, is at 25 tonnes per hectare, more than double what Kenya is doing. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}