Time bomb: Shrinking ancestral land in Kisii, Nyamira County cause worry and panic

While land fragmentation is a major problem in many parts of the world, in Kisii and Nyamira counties, it has been made worse by population pressure and poverty with family feuds often degenerating into protracted court cases and even death.

While the region has high agricultural productivity, land pressure has seen locals largely abandon cash crops such as coffee while pyrethrum is all but gone. Only tea plantations can be found in most households.

What distinguishes the Gusii community of the 1980s and beyond from the present is the reduced land sizes and extinction of cash crops that were the foundation of the region's economy