By KPC Reporter
Towards the end of the year, small scale tea growers in Gusii region had a reason to display broad smiles.
This was the time they earned bonus for the yearlong sweat, and it was good money.
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Some could arrive in the village with new items such as mattresses, radio and television sets, while others bought members of their household new dresses and shoes.
They also marked Christmas festivities, for the money was available to fund it.
Such exciting scenes have not been seen in recent years owing to various reasons, including the ever skyrocketing cost of living and dwindling earnings from the crop.
This week, hundreds of such growers gathered at Nyansiongo Tea Factory, where they pushed for streamlining of the sector for them to get better earnings from the business.
The farmers lamented that their counterparts from other parts of the country earned almost double bonuses in the just ended financial year.
They had come for a public participation session convened by the National Assembly’s Agriculture Committee, which was led by the chairperson Sabina Chege and her vice, Brighton Yegon, who is the Konoin MP.
The farmers blamed the prevailing scenario on lack of scientific tea testing methods, corrupt directors, huge electricity bills, double taxation and laxity of the Tea Board of Kenya (TBK) to fully implement the Tea Act, 2020.
“Factories should have internal auditors to expose theft. For example the Sh 2 million that would not be accounted by Matunwa Factory was discovered by an external auditor,” said Silvester Orina, a farmer.
Mr Orina said the tea auction in Mombasa was dominated by members from one region, disadvantaging other regions.
“Directors should tell us the reforms they have initiated and implemented since they assumed office,” Mr Orina said.
The farmers said there should be a policy that ensures that high qualified people get elected to be directors to represent factories at higher levels in the tea value chain such as TBK and the tea auction.
They lamented a conflict of interest where some directors were awarding their private companies tender to offer outsourced services such as security.
Kisii Senator Richard Onyonka, his Nyamira counterpart Okong’o O’Mogeni, Borabu MP Patrick Osero, among other elected leaders attended the meeting.
“It’s unfair to tax farmers twice; by charging them the transportation cost of tea from tea selling centres to the factory, and imposing a tea cess on them,” Mr O’Mogeni said.
The Senator asked the parliamentary committee that was led by its Chairperson Sabina Chege and vice Brighton Yegon to push for removal of the tea cess.
On his part, Mr Onyonka told management of factories in the region to be innovative and find ways of reducing operational costs and wastage.
“For example why don’t you install solar in the factories to cut the cost of electricity?” Mr Onyonka asked.
He claimed that managers were lax to invest in solar as it would deny them kickbacks when they pay electricity bills.
“Who doesn’t know that some people illegally sell fertilizer meant for farmers? These are the issues we should fix,” Mr Onyonka said.
Nyansiongo Tea Factory chairperson Monica Orwonchi said they had come up with strategies to reduce wastage and increase farmer earnings.
“We have reduced allocation to the management vote from 2.5 to 1.5 percent,” she said.
Ms Orwonchi said they had also summoned some tea buying centre committee members who had listed individuals who don’t own tea as farmers.
“We have summoned them to answer the question of stolen kilos,” she said.
She denied claims that some directors were offering outsourced services directly or through proxies to the factory.
“No director has a security company that offers service to the factory,” Orwonchi said.
It emerged that farmers affiliated to the factory were duped to buy two parcels of land for the planting of trees to be used in drying tea some years back.
“We accessed one of the parcels, the other was not accessible. We are in the process of pursuing a refund of farmers’ money from one of the parcels but I can say the purchase was hot air,” she said.
Ms Orwonchi said directors were only entitled to allowance and were not earning millions in form of salaries as alleged by farmers.
“We are in the process of hiring an internal auditor to detect any malpractice and the process will be completed soon,” she said.
MP Yegon said the house committee was in the West Rift region to find out what was ailing the sector at a time when farmers from the East Rift were getting better earnings from the crop.
“We are also looking for views to seal any loopholes in the Tea Act 2020 which is facing amendment in the National Assembly,” the Konoin MP said.
Meanwhile, Mr Osero and O’Mogeni took a swipe at Nyamira Governor Amos Nyaribo who skipped the meeting and was represented by the Agriculture executive committee member, Alice Manoti.
Mr Osero said the non-committal nature of the local leadership put farmers from the Gusii region at a disadvantage.
“During the tea conference held in Kericho last year, only County MP Jerusha Momanyi, her Kisii counterpart Doris Aburi and I attended from our region, while other regions in the country were represented by their governors and other elected leaders,” Mr Osero said.
He said lack of sufficient political push was likely to continue affecting farmers.
