NAIROBI, Kenya, Nov 29 – Agriculture PS Harry Kimutai has said that the government will continue to roll out emergency fertilizer subsidy programs to counter the ongoing global fertilizer crisis.
Kimutai, who spoke on Tuesday, urged the private sector to partner with the government to respond appropriately to the growing needs of farmers in the country, noting that agriculture plays a major role in stabilizing the economy of the country.
“We have been doing various interventions including emergency subsidy programs and providing an enabling environment for agri-business in the space to respond appropriately,” he said.
The PS also noted that the government had made tremendous progress in the facilitation of access and affordability of fertilizers to farmers since the onset of Covid-19 and its related impacts.
“The government has made steps in making sure there is affordable fertilizer for farmers. Since the onset of Covid-19, fertilizer prices increased due to the global fertilizer crisis also occasioned by the Ukraine and Russia conflict. As a government we will ensure we make provisions to continue having an affordable supply of fertilizer,” he said.
According to the Kimutai, agriculture will help eradicate the effects brought about by hunger in the country, adding that the government is obliged to make sure that every Kenyan is free from starvation.
“Our Constitution gives us the mandate to ensure every Kenyan is free from hunger and has adequate food. Our vision of development as the Ministry of Agriculture is to make sure we have proper food security in the country,” said Kimutai.
He further added that the government will strive to achieve a good percentage of food and nutritional security to curb the effects brought about by hunger and starvation, especially in the Northern Frontier.
A key factor of production that will see the government intervene on matters food security is land-soil fertility where the Ministry of Agriculture is keen to partner with Africa Fertilizer Organization (AFO) & International Fertilizer Development Gateway organizations to solve matters of fertilizer inefficiencies and lack of proper and appropriate information on the use of various types of fertilizers to enhance agricultural production in the country.
Kimutai, on his part, noted the importance of fertilizer in production saying that if efficiently used can contribute to more than 30 percent of the total crop yield.
“If the fertilizers are efficiently and effectively used, they can contribute more to more than approximately more than 30pc of our crop yield. That means that if we are to feed a population, we must efficiently and effectively use fertilizer to increase production.”
The government is keen on developing more interventions to support farmers in the country by providing appropriate information on the Ministry of Agriculture official website.
With regards to this, Kimutai stated that the government had developed a National Soil Fertility Management body mandated to regulate and provide more information on the usage of fertilizer by farmers from a robust research.
“We have laboratories within National Soil Fertility Management Center and other government research centers to help in testing the soil and inform the farmers what kind of fertilizer they need to use, the government is ready to help farmers in matters testing soil fertility in line with the Kenya Kwanza agricultural policy of subsidizing production.”
