Pyrethrum players work on reviving ailing industry

Suppliers of a pyrethrum extract to have backed a campaign to increase acreage under the crop as the widening gap between supply and demand in key markets threatens to destabilise the business.

Players in the pyrethrin supply chain say the country’s export level dipped to 5.7 tonnes in the last crop season, giving suppliers from other countries an edge in the international market once dominated by Kenya.

“We are in the country to devise new ways of getting more production from Kenya to meet the huge demand in the European market,” said Mr Miguel Araujo, a sales manager with DKSH, a leading pyrethrin distributor in Europe.

Up to 2003, Kenya used to command 80 per cent of the EU pyrethrin market. At the moment, distributors estimate the EU’s annual pyrethrin demand at 80 tonnes. The market is dominated by new comers like Tasmania (30 per cent), China and Rwanda.

Concern has been growing over the sector, once among the country’s largest foreign exchange earners, disappearance from the export markets.

From 200,000 growers once tilling up to 10,400 acres in Molo, Narok, Koibatek, Naivasha and Nyandarua five years ago, only 29,000 farmers in the country still grow pyrethrum in Kenya on less than 6,000 acres of land.

Farmers’ grievances over unpaid deliveries still stalk the sector long after some uprooted their crop and switched to better paying cash crops.

Over the last five years, Government efforts to revive the sector have borne no fruits.

There were high hopes among the industry players when the government kicked out the entire management of the Pyrethrum Board of Kenya and appointed a transition team in 2008 to spearhead reforms aimed at liberalising the sector.

The government initially gave the team three months to complete its task but later extended its term by another three months.

Mr Gem Argwings Kodhek, the man who led the transition team, says their effort to restructure the board was hampered by low budgetary allocation.

He is set to hand over the management this month to Mr Isaac Mulagoli, the new managing director seconded from agriculture ministry to implement the team’s recommendations.

“We managed to reduce the farmers’ arrears from Sh90 million to Sh54 million which we hope to pay soon, however the board could have done much more but the financial constraints worked against us,” Said Mr Kodhek.

The transition team recommended the amendment of the finance bill which would cater for the future of PBK in matters regarding registration of farmers besides liberalising the sector to allow other players to buy and process the flower.

If the bill is passed, it will allow for the restructuring of the pyrethrum board into a private, lean and profitable entity owned by farmers.

Liberalisation will mean that farmers will be able to grow pyrethrum without necessarily acquiring PBK licenses and will also sell their produce to PBK or any other established processor.

PBK is, however upbeat, that the situation will improve in the coming years and the sector will reclaim its leading role in the world market.

Currently, the board is working on its seed fields so as to supply quality planting seeds to the farmers in September. This is concurrent with a program to propagate seedlings for farmers from private companies to supplement those from its seed fields.

The new MD will face the uphill task of revitalising the ailing sector against the back drop of limited financial aid from the government.