Kaburu Mugambi
31 July 2007
Nairobi — Election of Cotton Development Authority members next week is the latest attempt by the Government to revive a cash crop that supported hundreds of thousands of Kenyans before its collapse in the 1990s. It is estimated that about 70,000 jobs were lost by 1999 and many farmers lost their livelihoods.
At one time, cotton was the fifth largest foreign exchange earner, after coffee, tea, pyrethrum and tourism. Lint production has gone through seasonal fluctuation with the number of bales produced peaking at 70,000 in 1984. Since then, production decreased to 20,000 bales in mid 1990s.
Import liberalisation in the 1990s led to an influx of imported textiles and garments - new and old - displacing demand for locally produced cotton products.
Consequently, cotton and lint production went down as well as local textiles and garments manufacturing, leading to the closure of several key industries in the sub-sector. Liberalisation opened the industry to private sector participation from production, ginning and marketing to input supply.
No organisation took up the roles previously played by the Cotton Board of Kenya, among them ensuring there was adequate planting seed. The board's ginneries were sold to private entrepreneurs and marketing was decontrolled while prices of seed cotton were determined by supply and demand.
The cotton board became redundant and stakeholders operated without coordination and regulation. Cooperative societies' roles were taken over by the private sector.
The coming into effect in 2000 of African Growth and Opportunity Act (Agoa) - a US law that provides duty-free access to some 6,400 products including textiles into the US market for African nations - provided a revival opportunity.
But the Kenya Institute for Public Policy Research and Analysis (Kippra) says Kenya failed to take advantage of this opportunity and instead foreign firms moved in and invested in the Export Processing Zones (EPZs) and took advantage of the duty- and quota-free exports to the US.
"This development led to considerable employment generation in the EPZ, however the local cotton production did not increase to provide sufficient raw materials for the industries in the EPZ," Kippra says in a report.
This led to more imports of raw materials and the industry has not been able to substantially benefit from Agoa.
Election of members of the newly formed regulatory authority to govern cotton sector will be held on August 8 in all electoral zones across the country. Each province apart from Nairobi has one slot in the authority and the Government. To join the seven farmers are four members nominated by ginners and cotton growers' associations.
Kenya Cotton Growers' Association would elect two members - one representing Eastern region, which covers North Eastern, Coast, Central and Eastern provinces and the other Western region covering Nyanza, Western and Rift Valley.
Kenya Cotton Ginners' Association will have two members representing the Eastern and Western regions. The board will elect its chairman among its members and appoint the authority's chief executive. Ministries of Finance, Agriculture and Cooperative Development and Marketing will sit in the authority.
The Government has already disbursed Sh171 million to establish the authority and a secretariat. Among other things, the authority is expected to regulate cotton growing and ginning and carry out research and development in production and processing.
The Government now agrees the mistake was the opening up of the industry to private sector participation in planting, ginning and marketing without a body to oversee the processes. In particular, there was no organisation to ensure farmers received adequate and quality seeds.
Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (Kari) director Ephraim Mukisira says farmers resorted to recycling seeds, which affected quality and dipped production. "Incidentally, cotton is a commodity with majority of pests and diseases," Dr Mukisira said.
The Government had set aside Sh241 million for the revival of the sector in the last financial year, bringing total government's financial support to Sh492 million so far. The Kippra study calls on the country to deal with inefficient and uncompetitive production through use of modern technology and lowering costs of inputs such as electricity.
It is estimated that Kenya imports over Sh47 million worth of second-hand clothing annually. Local manufacturers supply about 45 per cent of the Kenyan textile market requirements while imported new and used clothes account for about 37 per cent of the market. Demand for textile products in the country is estimated to be growing at 3.8 per cent annually.
High potential
Agriculture minister Kipruto arap Kirwa says while the Government appreciates that the sector is liberalised, it would work to bring the sector back on its feet. "Lack of a regulatory authority has been an impediment to the growth of the cotton sector," the minister said.
Government says the country has potential of growing 350,000 hectares of cotton with capacity to produce 260,000 bales or 52 million kilos. Currently only 30,450 hectares is under cotton, producing 45,000 bales, or nine million kilos against the local lint demand of 200,000 bales, or 40 million kilos.
There are about 50 registered textile mills with a capacity of 120,000 bales, or 24 million kilos, of cotton lint annually. However actual volume processed is about 55,000 bales, or 11 million kilos, which means that most mills are operating below capacity and about 40,000 bales, or 8 million kilos, are imported.
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2007 The Nation. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
