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NEWS & CURRENT AFFAIRS

The Nairobian

Farmers want Mumias to stop selling cane to rival millers

News

By Brian Kisanji | Oct 07, 2020

Sugarcane farmers allied to Mumias Sugar Company now want the miller to stop selling its cane to rivals.

Farmers in the region are optimistic that the current receiver-manager Ponangipalli Venkata Ramana Rao will help revive the company only if he can invest more in cane development and stop the sale of mature cane to neighboring millers.

This comes after the resumption of milling at the once giant company was put on the track by the recent planting of over 700 acres of cane in its nucleus estate.

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But farmers are calling on the receiver-manager to ensure that the cane is not sold to other millers when it matures.

Last year the management at the miller announced they were selling mature sugarcane on the firm's nucleus estate to other local millers.

The neighbouring Busia Sugar Industry (BSI) and Nzoia Sugar Company were the major buyers of sugarcane from Mumias.

The farmers led by Peter Salasia said they will support the receiver-manager in his efforts but cautioned against sale of the sugarcane.

"Our miller has been too brotherly to our revivals around but we need to stop any sale of sugarcane and now concentrate on our own revival," said Salasia.

The farmers now feel with the current cane development being done at the nucleus estate they too can retake up the sugarcane farming in anticipation of miller’s revival.

“We fully support the receiver-manager in his effort to revive our company, that is why even as farmers we are retaking up sugarcane farming again,” said Salasia.

Mumias has not milled for over 18 months due to factors like lack of raw materials.

If well maintained the over 8,000 acres nucleus estate would help supply enough raw material to the millers.