Farmers pitch camp at NCPB as Kenya stops buying maize

Kisumu, Kenya: More than 200 trucks of maize have camped for three weeks at the Kisumu National Cereals and Produce Board (NCPB) waiting to offload the cereals.

The farmers, mainly from Trans Nzoia and Uasin Gishu, said they were told by the board to bring the cereals to Kisumu depots, only to be kept waiting.

"Why did they tell us to bring the maize if they did not want our produce? We are incurring huge loses as each day passes," said Thomas Bowen, a farmer.

But NCPB Senior Public Relations Officer Titus Maiyo said the board has reached its Sh100 million projection, and cannot receive any more maize.

STATE PROJECTION

Mr Maiyo said the Government had so far paid out Sh4.3 billion for the purchase of maize.

"The first tranche of Sh2.7 billion was exhausted and an additional Sh1.6 billion issued later on. So far, Sh1.5 million for 90kg bags have been purchased," he said.

And for second day now, the farmers staged demonstrations next to the board's offices to compel them to buy the produce.

"We would have sold the maize locally, even at a throw-away price instead of travelling all the way to this place," said Mr Bowen.

To transport 35 bags of the produce from Trans Nzoia to Kisumu would cost a farmer as much as Sh80,000, with additional daily charges of Sh3,000.

"If you include daily waiting charges, farmers will be losing huge sums of money," said Stephen Sang, a transporter.

In previous weeks, NCPB has been buying a 90kg bag of the produce at Sh2,800, a figure farmers said is still profitable.