Horticulture farmers call for more extension officers

Horticulture farmers in Kirinyaga want the county government to increase the number of extension officers to guide them in battling market hindrances that are denying them optimal returns. They cited pests and diseases as well as global market quality controls as the major handicaps dogging their agribusiness ventures.

In a meeting held in Kagio market, the farmers through their group chairman Elias Mugambi said they have suffered losses in the past six months and risk even more with the threat of a European Union (EU) market ban owing to use of certain pesticides and herbicides.

Mr Mugambi lamented that the lack of sensitisation from qualified authorities has left farmers at the mercies of commercial agrovets who are selling substandard products.

“As a result, we continue to suffer crop damages and loss of markets since we only operate at God’s mercies that once we are lucky to escape pests and diseases and arrive at the market windows with our produce, we will pass the quality tests,” he said.

He lamented that in the recent past the county has been treated like a laboratory to test scientific innovations where organisations show up to experiment innovations and afterwards leave farmers none the better.

“We have been hosting international programmes in agriculture which get governmental clearance to camp in our farms in the name of helping us improve production and manage critical pests and diseases. The trend has been in place for the past 10 years. Only six months ago, we were banned from exporting to the EU market. We are tired of these games of musical chairs,” he said.

The farmers reported major disease threats to be bacterial wilt, late blight, tomato yellow leaf curl virus, the American boll worm and trips.

Ms Teresia Karanja from the department of agriculture said plans are underway to front experts from the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (Kari) to help address the threats. She said Kirinyaga, Meru, Isiolo, Nairobi, Nakuru and Kajiado counties had been mapped for immediate mitigation programmes to fight pests and diseases.

Among the measures include training farmers and extension officers and appropriate pesticides.