Feedlot farming: The new cashcow for Kenya's beef industry operators

Maria Mbeneka at Ranch Experts feedlot in Laikipia North Sub-County, Laikipia County. [Nanjinia Wamuswa, Standard]

Anyone entering the feedlot at Ranch Experts must first disinfect their shoes to prevent the spread of disease among the animals.

The caution is understandable. A single lapse in biosecurity could introduce disease, potentially infecting and killing livestock worth billions of shillings.

This is why Maria Mbeneka and her co-founder, Stella Kaparo, strictly enforce biosecurity to protect their livestock.

Mbeneka explains that a feedlot is essentially an intensive livestock-finishing unit where young animals, particularly cattle, are confined and fed a balanced diet to gain weight quickly before being sold.

The animals’ diet includes hay, silage, grains, crop by-products and minerals, carefully combined to support rapid and healthy growth.

“In a feedlot, livestock gain weight faster. There is better control of feeding and animal health, more predictable finishing weights and improved meat quality and market value,” she explains.

However, the co-founders had never imagined that they would one day venture into the feedlot business.

It began in 2018 with a few female goats given to support the livelihoods of women participating in Hongera Mama, a maternal health programme that sought to bring healthcare services closer to mothers in Laikipia North Sub-County, Laikipia County.

The women began keeping and multiplying the goats, and soon it became clear that livestock could provide them with a sustainable source of income.

“It then became apparent that this was a viable business for these women, as well as an opportunity to support pastoralist women,” Mbeneka says.

Michael Murithi, founder and chief executive officer of Gatiko Feedlots, near Nanyuki town in Laikipia County. [Nanjinia Wamuswa, Standard]

The experience prompted Mbeneka and Stella to explore livestock as a business. In 2019, they formally established Ranch Experts, initially dealing in sheep and goats before venturing into cattle.

The business started with 50 cattle, while also aggregating small stock and supplying butchers in Karatina, Nyeri, and Nanyuki.

Today, the company off-takes between 20 and 30 cattle a month and is targeting 80. Its feedlot has a capacity of 1,000 heads.

The minimum entry weight into its feedlot is between 250kg and 280kg, although breed and age also influence the animals’ performance.

Once inside the feedlot, the company targets a weight gain of at least 1.2kg per day.

The business has since expanded into livestock production, aggregation, feedlot management, digital technology and international markets.

Mbeneka says, entering such a business was not simply about buying cattle and feeding them. It required understanding animal health, fodder, water, markets, finances and, importantly, the economics of every animal entering the facility.

Mbeneka reveals that each animal requires at least 50 litres of water a day.

She explains: “You need a very good management system, animal health assistance and, of course, the vets who come and look at the animals.”

The company weighs its cattle weekly to monitor weight gain and uses the information to track feeding, treatment and labour costs.

She says the company has increasingly relied on technology and data to improve its operations.

They developed Flockr, a digital platform, where the system records animals entering the feedlot, including their weight, treatment history and identification.

Today, it’s also a marketplace where livestock buyers and sellers can interact.

The platform allows farmers to list animals, upload pictures, respond to buyers, make offers and counter-offers and receive buy requests.

“The platform has so far captured about 4,500 pastoralists in its system and has recorded an uptake of about 1,500 users,” Mbeneka says.

However, the technology initially faced cultural resistance. For pastoralists, livestock trading is largely built on trust, and some farmers were initially uncomfortable buying or selling animals without physically meeting the other party.

She reveals they are also exploring traceability for hides and skins, allowing a hide to be linked to the farm and animal from which it originated and eventually traced through the leather value chain.

But successful transactions have gradually changed that perception. She explains that, when paying farmers, the prevailing market rate is critical to sustaining the relationship.

Mbeneka discloses that international livestock trade is capital-intensive and requires access to financing.

Dr Dennis Ogaso, livestock production coordinator at Heifer International Kenya, explains that livestock production is a key economic activity and source of livelihood for pastoral and agropastoral households in Laikipia County.

However, livestock productivity remains below its potential due to recurrent feed shortages, limited adoption of improved production practices, inadequate animal health management and limited access to practical livestock production technologies.

These challenges affect livestock performance, household incomes and the resilience of communities to climate-related shocks.

To address these challenges, Heifer International, through the Kenya Livestock Marketing and Resilience Project (KLMP), in partnership with the Swedish Embassy, is collaborating with private-sector actors such as Gatiko Farm and Ranch Expert to strengthen livestock market systems and enhance the competitiveness and resilience of livestock producers.

“Through the partnerships, the project leverages the technical expertise of the actors to support livestock producers in adopting improved production practices that enhance productivity and profitability,” Dr Ogaso says.

Additionally, he says, KLMP supports market actors to improve their efficiency and unlock new markets through co-matching interventions, including training and capacity building, field days, breed improvement plans, fodder production and participation in conferences and expos for learning and knowledge exchange.

For Michael Murithi, feedlot farming grew out of a family livestock-trading tradition and a desire to solve one of the biggest problems facing the beef industry: the inconsistent supply of quality and finished animals during dry periods.

Murithi, founder and chief executive of Gatiko Feedlots, about three kilometres from Nanyuki town in Laikipia County, inherited his interest in livestock from his grandfather, who had been a cattle trader since 1945.

“My grandfather sold animals to the Kenya Meat Commission and also operated a butchery in Nyeri County,” he says.

Growing up around livestock markets exposed Murithi to the opportunities and challenges within the sector.

Although Kenya has large numbers of cattle, he noticed that the supply of well-finished animals was not guaranteed throughout the year.

“There were many cattle, but the availability of good-quality, finished beef was not always guaranteed throughout the year. The problem became particularly evident during dry seasons, when pasture and water shortages affected the condition of animals,” he recalls.

His interest in feedlot farming deepened after an organisation took a group of livestock farmers to South Africa and Namibia to learn about livestock production. In Namibia, he encountered a more mechanised feedlot system and began considering whether the model could work in Kenya.

Today, Gatiko Feedlots can accommodate about 200 cattle at a time. Animals undergo a 90- 100-day finishing programme, during which they can gain between 1kg and 1.5kg daily before being taken to market.

Murithi sources cattle from farmers and livestock markets across the country. The business also works with ranchers and conservancies that keep animals belonging to community members. It can lease grazing management from livestock owners at between Sh700 and Sh800 per cow per month.

He sees feedlot finishing as a way of turning livestock farming into a more commercially planned enterprise.

“With feedlot finishing, you can sell an animal at about two years at around 400kg instead of keeping it for much longer,” he says.

Yet, the business comes with significant challenges, particularly the high cost of feed. At times, Murithi is forced to source maize and maize products from as far away as Uganda, with transport costs eating into profit margins.

Murithi has responded by investing in its own feed production. The enterprise uses silage, molasses and toxin binders as part of its feeding strategy.

“When there is a bumper harvest, farmers should store their feeds. When the dry season comes, they will have something to feed their animals,” he advises.

He also cautions farmers against moving cattle through multiple markets, which can affect their condition, while low beef prices can wipe out margins after expenditure on feed, labour and animal health. His enterprise employs about 12 permanent workers and up to 50 casual workers engaged at different times. Women and young people from informal settlements around Nanyuki have also benefited from the employment opportunities.

The feedlot has also become a learning platform for farmers from Laikipia, Samburu, Isiolo, Maasai communities, Nyeri and Meru.