Galana-Kulalu irrigation project will not be privatised, says PS

 

The government has dismissed claims that there are plans to privatise the one-million-acre Galana-Kulalu irrigation project in Kilifi and Tana River counties.

Agriculture Principal Secretary Richard Lesiyampe said the government was only looking for strategic partners who would put the land into produce use.

“This is miscommunication. It is not true that we want to give that land to private individuals or want to sell it. There is no government land that can be sold without going through Parliament,” he said.

Speaking to journalists after an induction meeting with members of the National Assembly Agriculture Committee in Mombasa, the PS said they will be transparent in bringing on board the strategic partners.

“We want to bring all land that is arable and that is idle under agriculture. In the framework of doing this, the issues will be public and open,” he said.

Laying strategies

The Jubilee government, he said, is not in the business of doing farming, but rather laying strategies and a framework of enabling locals and other private companies to do farming.

Last week, about 10 MPs from Mombasa, Kwale, Kilifi and Tana River counties vowed to evict whoever is allocated land by the government.

Former Water Cabinet Secretary Eugene Wamalwa, who has been moved to the Devolution ministry, said the government would hand over 20,000 acres to private firms to increase the acreage under maize.

The project, which was launched in 2014, is billed as Kenya’s long-awaited solution to perennial food insecurity.

In 2014, the government, through the National Irrigation Board, signed a Sh14.5-billion deal with an Israeli firm, Green Arava, to set up a model farm for the planting of maize.