Nairobi — President William Ruto has announced the establishment of Common User Facilities (CUF) to enhance value addition and branding in locally manufactured products especially tea.
Speaking on Wednesday at the launch of Chai Gold by Kenya Tea Packers (KETEPA) and Kenya Tea Development Agency (KTDA) in Kericho County, the president said it has been their plan to stop Kenyan tea from being sold unprocessed by establishing CUF that will add value to it.
"Kenyan tea is a very high value premium tea, in all these years, it has been used by other countries to blend their tea that isn't as premium as ours, helping them to sell at the expense of ours," he said.
"We are going to work with the tea sector to enhance productivity through our injection of resources in fertilizer subsidy and the Common User Facility which will help in branding and value addition," he added.
President Ruto noted that the Chai Gold brand launch is a step forward toward the kickoff of tea branding.
He highlighted that in the last two years, branded Kenyan tea has moved from 5 per cent to 9 per cent and with the establishment of CUF, he is hopeful it will move to 20 per cent in the next two years.
"We want to make sure that the tea kilograms that we are going to brand and value-add increases from 5 million to 15 million," he stated.
He urged Ketepa company leaders to support all the other factories in branding and value addition programs.
"It will not be possible for all tea factories to have their own branding facility and that is why were putting up the common User Facility so that all the factories can be accommodated here," he noted.
"The CUF is open to all factories that have different brands in order to broaden our tea branding program and its market," he added.
The president also revealed that the CUF will be open to micro and small enterprises that have markets in different parts of the continent who wish to brand products.
The CUF will be established in Nairobi to serve the Eastern part of the country and the one in Kericho will serve the Western part.
