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{
    "id": 774429,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/774429/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 276,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Wetangula",
    "speaker_title": "The Senate Minority Leader",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 210,
        "legal_name": "Moses Masika Wetangula",
        "slug": "moses-wetangula"
    },
    "content": " Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, for an opportunity to contribute to this Bill. Warehousing is one of the most critical components in commodity handling. In this country, we have statistics that show that post-harvest management of cereals and other products occasions farmers losses of up to 60 or 70 per cent. So, this Bill comes at a time when the country is devolving activities and where value addition is now the trend in the agricultural sector. So, it is important that order and sanity is brought to the management of warehouse products. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, a Bill is important to the extent that it will streamline, keep management records and produce statistics that can be of use and help even for the future. If you want to look at the records of production of food products in this country today; for example, if you go to your area of Meru, Mitungu and those areas, there are no tomatoes in this country better than what comes from that area. But, if you look at statistics on how to leverage on this, help the farmer, warehouse them, keep records and market them, we in the west do not have to grow tomatoes because we can depend on you. You also do not have to grow maize, because you can depend on us. This is how a country can coexist and live with each other in a better way. This can only be done when there is a legal regime that brings order and sanity to these kind of products. In fact, Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I have been seeing a mushrooming of what they call ‘cold storage’ warehouses, but they are being done in a very haphazard manner. I have seen in one place where they have sunk in about Kshs10 million to put up a warehouse for storage of tomatoes where no tomatoes are grown. This is the same madness that came to this country when people jumped on to something called fish farming. You would find somebody going to Mandera to put up a fish pond, where evaporation of water is 95 per cent. By the time you put in the fish, 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."
}