Cover against frost targets tea growers after losses

The Kenya Tea Development Agency (KTDA) plans to introduce an insurance cover against frost which has affected tea production.

The marketing agency for more than 500,000 small-scale farmers will launch the cover through its underwriting arm Majani Insurance Brokers, which is looking for partnerships with insurers.

“Majani Insurance Brokers is holding consultations with its partners in the industry with a view to developing a tea crop insurance product targeting small-scale tea farmers,” said KTDA head of corporate communications Charles Kimathi.
The agency estimates that up to a third of tea bushes in Nandi Hills have been affected by the extreme weather conditions, especially in the catchment area serving the Chebut and Kaptumo factories. The damage in the Mount Kenya region is estimated at nearly 20 per cent, said KTDA.

Severely affected
“Parts of Kiambu, Murang’a and Nyeri regions have also been severely affected, with the damage in some factories’ catchment recorded at between 15 and 20 per cent of area under tea,” said Mr Kimathi.

According to Financial Sector Deepening Sector Kenya, four underwriters — Co-operative Insurance Company, APA, UAP and Jubilee Kenya — are among those that are keen to work jointly with KTDA on a compensation package for the small holder tea sector.
“We are about to conclude discussions with KTDA to develop contracts. We intend to use satellite data because it records temperatures at night,” said Mr Michael Mbaka, project manager for index-based weather insurance at FSD.

The Kenya Tea Board, which regulates the sector, said that the area affected by the frost represented about two per cent of the 170,000 hectares under the crop.

The KTDA move follow similar plans by the World Bank, which is said to be working with a leading underwriter to provide a new insurance product to protect tea and maize farmers in the Mount Kenya region from effects of bad weather.

The two insurance packages would be the first protection of its kind for commercial tea farming in Kenya.

James Finlays Kenya and Unilever Tea Company – both plantation farms have singled out Olenguruone area—within the Mau catchment area and Mabroukie in Kericho respectively as the most affected.

Frost is a condition that withers leaves and leads to loss of crop. Agriculturalists say it is an aspect of climate change common in Central Kenya between December and February and before the short rains.