Given the raging controversy surrounding the Government’s scheme to pay private millers to mill and package subsidised maize flour, it is clear a new approach to the food crisis is required.
Significant amounts of money, released from public coffers, are being used up in purchases of maize at Sh1,750 a bag, if bought locally, and more if imported and channelled through Kenya’s only bulk grain terminal. More money, Sh200 a bag, is paid to millers to prepare and package sifted flour for retail sales. Even more is lost as millers keep byproducts such as bran and husks.
In a crisis largely mismanaged through inefficient interventions, this activity only achieves a two-tier price system at great expense to the taxpayer. It is also hampered by the inherent inefficiencies in the local cereals distribution system. The National Cereals and Produce Board is not up to the task it has been given. And, as matters become more difficult with the full impact of crop failure and inadequate imports bein felt, this will be a crucial issue.
Grain
As the pressure rises, simpler strategies are needed. Delays and cost increases at sea, at the Mombasa Port, on our railways, at NCPB and millers and on along the supply chain have to be studied and addressed.
Is there a reason to insist on providing people with flour that is milled at great expense when it would be cheaper to sell maize to them and let them either mill it at local posho mills or eat the grains whole in meals like githeri and muthokoi?
