Head smut may have hit up to half of maize farms in North Rift, says PS

The maize disease that is ravaging farms in Kenya’s bread basket of North Rift could have affected between 30-50 per cent of individual fields, posing a food security threat in a country already grappling with a shortage.

Agriculture PS Richard Lesiyampe said head smut disease normally affects almost half of the production in the affected field.

“Individual fields affected by the head smut may have losses in the range of 30-50 per cent,” he said.

Mr Lesiyampe said in Kenya, head smut is found in maize growing areas, but often in very low proportions.

There have been complaints from farmers in Nandi (Ol’lessos), ElgeyoMarakwet (Kamoi), Trans Nzoia (Endebess) and Uasin Gishu (Moiben) counties of outbreak of what was reported as a new disease on maize.

The PS noted that the investigations conducted by the government agencies revealed that all varieties of maize were affected, contrary to claims by farmers that certain breeds from the Kenya Seed Company bore the infection.

He said the disease was rampant in farms that had exhibited poor crop husbandry as revealed by the study that was conducted.

Mr Lesiyampe said farmers who harvested in the previous season and left the materials contaminated by the disease on the ground or fed to livestock had 90 per cent of their current crop affected.

Cereal Growers Association chief executive Anthony Kioko says a lot of farmers have raised complaints over the disease and that the government should address the matter urgently to avoid recurrence of the disease in the subsequent crops.

“Farmers are concerned about this disease and what the government should do now is to put in place measures to stop its reemergence in the next crop seasons,” said Mr Kioko.

Inadequate rains

This comes at a time when the ministry has announced that there would be a decline in maize production this year following poor weather that resulted to
Food security report from the Ministry of Agriculture indicates that maize yields will this year fall to 32.2 million bags, down from the 36.8 million bags harvested in 2015, reflecting a 12 per cent drop.

The ministry reckons that the long rains of between March and May were inadequate, a sign that Kenya would rely on imports to meet its annual maize needs of nearly 40 million bags.

A poor crop for Kenya’s staple food is set to put pressure on inflation on high maize prices, cripple the milling plants and hit the government budget because of maize imports to ease the forecast shortage.