Dairy farmers demand ownership of KCC

MPs Alfred Keter (Nandi Hills), Silas Tiren (Moiben) and Keiyo South Jackson Kiptanui said farmers will enjoy the economies of scale and break even in the enterprise if they are allowed to own the enterprise as before. PHOTO: COURTESY

Leaders from the North Rift want the Government to revert management of the New Kenya Cooperative Creameries (NKCC) back to dairy farmers.

The farmers opposed to plans to privatise NKCC, have  at the same time criticised the Government for running down the sector, saying the move has hugely hurt their economic prosperity.

They said government efforts to revive the sector have been futile, hence exposing dairy farmers to exploitative brokers and private firms, who charge exorbitant prices.

Uasin Gishu Governor Jackson Mandago observed that since the management of the creamery collapsed, farmers have been subjected to poor pricing making the sector non-profitable.

Speaking in Eldoret, Mandago said the North Rift have reached a consensus to foot the Sh600 million needed to revive NKCC so that it may be given back to the farmers and questioned plans to privatise the company yet the Government only pumped Sh600 million to help revive it.

MPs Alfred Keter (Nandi Hills), Silas Tiren (Moiben) and Keiyo South Jackson Kiptanui said farmers will enjoy the economies of scale and break even in the enterprise if they are allowed to own the enterprise as before.

Keter said it would be imprudent for the government to privatise the sector instead of addressing the underlying issues affecting the farmers.