HK Explain These Headlines

[Omollo]

• Tweet

Some Asks Whether These Headlines are from Greek Newspapers

[hk]

I don't think there's anyone who disputes that price of basic commodities has gone up. The reason being we aren't efficient producers of those basic commodities. Farmers haven't embraced new farming techniques. Electricity, when there's drought hydropower production goes down, that's why we need to invest in more geothermal. Its only maybe flowers and horticulture that kenya is efficient producer. That need to be replicated in all other sector of agriculture. Barclays is stuck in brick and mortar world, its only now that they have started agency banking and mobile banking.
In 3 months prices of commodities will be back to norm but go up next year during dry season if we don't increase our productivity.

[Omollo]

Farmers haven't embraced new farming techniques. Why has that not happened when Jubilee's 2013 Manifesto promised to deliver mechanization and bla bla ... just read:




invest in more geothermal.
Is that so? Why then has the GDC turned into a milch cow for Jubilee. To turn it into a GEMA front for collecting campaign funds, the state acted to remove one bunch of corrupt managers and installed a pure GEMA management. The eating continued:
The Ethnic Rag

It looks to me like it is not possible to invest in Geothermal while there are thieves put in place to steal the cash. The solution is not investment of more money right now but the removal of all hindrances to investment, don't you agree?

FlowersIf the exports remain at the 2016 levels or slightly lower, doesn't that say something? You are the expert.
In 3 months prices of commodities will be back to norm but go up next year during dry season if we don't increase our productivity.I take it you will not be taking MoonKi's challenge. I won't either. I do not expect food security for this country for a very long time. If we are lucky and NASA takes over then we need 7 years by my calculation to get it right.
Here is what Jubilee promised:

Double and diversify our national strategic food reserves from the current 22% to 40% of annual consumption.

Incase you wish to know the current level of strategic food reserves is ZERO%

I don't think there's anyone who disputes that price of basic commodities has gone up. The reason being we aren't efficient producers of those basic commodities. Farmers haven't embraced new farming techniques. Electricity, when there's drought hydropower production goes down, that's why we need to invest in more geothermal.

Its only maybe flowers and horticulture that kenya is efficient producer. That need to be replicated in all other sector of agriculture. Barclays is stuck in brick and mortar world, its only now that they have started agency banking and mobile banking.
In 3 months prices of commodities will be back to norm but go up next year during dry season if we don't increase our productivity.

[hk]

The reason why horticulture does well is because its ran as a business and also note that government has very little to do with it. Its no surprise the only agriculture sector that's thriving government isn't involved. 2016 earnings were up 12%, 2017 we're in May. And if direct flights to America come to fruition, that's another potential huge market. Farmers with the help of county government now that agriculture is devolved can be trained to use modern techniques. Take dairy farming, I was shocked to find out that in some counties farmers don't use artificial insemination. In those counties raw milk price average ksh.80 per litre.
Geothermal there's plenty of wells that have be drilled its only that companies which are suppose to produce electricity have not started. Maybe the reason is power generation is liberalized but transmission and distribution are not.

[gout]

Nobody wants to do any productive work like farming while only the brokers, politicians, tenderpreneurs, thugs, drug barons are the only one getting money. Everybody wants to leave the meaningful jobs to pursue a 'deal', hustle and such.

Why undertake stressful and expensive farming while the fertilizer, seeds, the harvest brokers, transporters, processors and millers are the ones making the money?

When government officials interact with Kenyans they are mainly extorting some bribe. 

[Omollo]

The reason why horticulture does well is because its ran as a business and also note that government has very little to do with it. Its no surprise the only agriculture sector that's thriving government isn't involved. 2016 earnings were up 12%, 2017 we're in May. And if direct flights to America come to fruition, that's another potential huge market. Farmers with the help of county government now that agriculture is devolved can be trained to use modern techniques. Take dairy farming, I was shocked to find out that in some counties farmers don't use artificial insemination. In those counties raw milk price average ksh.80 per litre.
Geothermal there's plenty of wells that have be drilled its only that companies which are suppose to produce electricity have not started. Maybe the reason is power generation is liberalized but transmission and distribution are not.

We can play the political angle for ever with me placing the blame on Jubilee and you avoiding blaming anybody.

The bottom line when it comes to milk:

There was enough milk before Mzungu came. He faced such competition that itv was the official government policy to destock Kamba and Maasai herds so that Mzungu could compete! So much for capitalism. That nonsense is still going on.

How does one return cattle to Kamba land as before? The trick lies in repairing the damage done to make it inhospitable for cattle. One can sue the British government and get compensation and use some to reforest and buy land and set out for communal grazing. That has no worked very well.

The key to milk production is not zero grazing. It lies in strengthening and modernizing the people who are already keeping hundreds of thousands of cattle but with very little milk to show for it!

Learn from how Sweden, Norway and Finland have helped the Sami to modernize Reindeer rearing in to a multimillion dollar industry.

The cows kept by Pundit at home in Litein are just pets which he should be encouraged to keep and even give names. But the country whose population will double in less than 50 years cannot depend on pets for milk. We need large scale call it it industrial, farms but grounded in the culture of the people. A guy who owns 1000 cows in Pokot given aid and provided security and infrastructure can easily supply Uhuru's Brookside needs for a month with one day's milk production.

I have seen the Fulani change their habits and get into milk production. It is not easy but it can work.

I was in Pokot recently and saw rivers (not big but rivers all the same). Yet there was drought. I know of a pump which can be run by a tractor and can sprinkle water from any river to a radius of 6 kilometers. I am told the one I saw was one of the smallest. That to me is like rain.

What we are lacking is the commitment to solve problems. The overriding desire is to get projects to "eat from"

[hk]

The reason why horticulture does well is because its ran as a business and also note that government has very little to do with it. Its no surprise the only agriculture sector that's thriving government isn't involved. 2016 earnings were up 12%, 2017 we're in May. And if direct flights to America come to fruition, that's another potential huge market. Farmers with the help of county government now that agriculture is devolved can be trained to use modern techniques. Take dairy farming, I was shocked to find out that in some counties farmers don't use artificial insemination. In those counties raw milk price average ksh.80 per litre.
Geothermal there's plenty of wells that have be drilled its only that companies which are suppose to produce electricity have not started. Maybe the reason is power generation is liberalized but transmission and distribution are not.

We can play the political angle for ever with me placing the blame on Jubilee and you avoiding blaming anybody.

The bottom line when it comes to milk:

There was enough milk before Mzungu came. He faced such competition that itv was the official government policy to destock Kamba and Maasai herds so that Mzungu could compete! So much for capitalism. That nonsense is still going on.

How does one return cattle to Kamba land as before? The trick lies in repairing the damage done to make it inhospitable for cattle. One can sue the British government and get compensation and use some to reforest and buy land and set out for communal grazing. That has no worked very well.

The key to milk production is not zero grazing. It lies in strengthening and modernizing the people who are already keeping hundreds of thousands of cattle but with very little milk to show for it!

Learn from how Sweden, Norway and Finland have helped the Sami to modernize Reindeer rearing in to a multimillion dollar industry.

The cows kept by Pundit at home in Litein are just pets which he should be encouraged to keep and even give names. But the country whose population will double in less than 50 years cannot depend on pets for milk. We need large scale call it it industrial, farms but grounded in the culture of the people. A guy who owns 1000 cows in Pokot given aid and provided security and infrastructure can easily supply Uhuru's Brookside needs for a month with one day's milk production.

I have seen the Fulani change their habits and get into milk production. It is not easy but it can work.

I was in Pokot recently and saw rivers (not big but rivers all the same). Yet there was drought. I know of a pump which can be run by a tractor and can sprinkle water from any river to a radius of 6 kilometers. I am told the one I saw was one of the smallest. That to me is like rain.

What we are lacking is the commitment to solve problems. The overriding desire is to get projects to "eat from"

There was enough milk before mzungu in kamba and maasai land, really? I don't know how you arrived at that, but suppose you are right. Could it be because population was very low and its not that milk production was high then? In another thread I had argued that pastoral communities that are disproportionately affected by starvation should modernize their livestock farming. It needn't be zero grazing but simple things like growing fodder to cater for dry season.  I agree we need to get to industrial type of farming similar to flower sector.
In pokot how come no one is doing that and there are plenty of pokots with enough money to do so?

[Omollo]

There was an official colonial policy called "Destocking". Read about it please
 
Could it be because population was very low and its not that milk production was high then? : On the contrary the excuse used was that there was over-stocking. It was partially true because the Agriculture department had been dispatched to Kambaland to turn the land in to farming land as a way of reducing the grazing areas to meet the objective of destocking.

There is no past or existing policy to help pastoralists to modernize. All they ask them is to surrender "illegal guns" and then issue them with Government guns. The thieves in Nairobi know the value of those animals and hence finance rustling and blame the pastoralists

It needn't be zero grazing: You missed the point. I don't think zero grazing will solve our beef and milk requirements in the years ahead. That and ordinary pet farming (the type Pundit practices in Bomet) could manage upto the 80s. However when Moi increased milk consumption with his Nyayo milk, for a brief period Kenyans realized they had to stop smuggling KCC UHT milk to Tanzania and Uganda because there was no surplus.
 One of the lessons I learned around the world is that security is the mother of investment. Take a Fulani cattle owner with 3000 heads of cattle. He has with him at any time 1 million dollars wrapped around his body and on his camels etc. Half of that passes through his hands on a daily basis.

When I asked him to build an office block for us to rent because fucking donor would not allow us to build and use: He told me he must recover his entire investment before the buildings are completed. Reason: There will come war, the building will be destroyed or seized by the new rulers and he will lose his money. How can a Pokot man put up a modern ranch when rustlers will come and seize the animals?

BTW rustling is a problem in all countries but it has been reduced:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/30/bovine-bother-500-cows-stolen-new-zealand-biggest-cattle-farm-theft

In pokot how come no one is doing that and there are plenty of pokots with enough money to do so?

There was enough milk before mzungu in kamba and maasai land, really? I don't know how you arrived at that, but suppose you are right.

Could it be because population was very low and its not that milk production was high then?

In another thread I had argued that pastoral communities that are disproportionately affected by starvation should modernize their livestock farming.
It needn't be zero grazing but simple things like growing fodder to cater for dry season.  I agree we need to get to industrial type of farming similar to flower sector.

In pokot how come no one is doing that and there are plenty of pokots with enough money to do so?

[hk]

So basically kambas had a lot of cows but those cows produce very little milk per head. Destocking would have been inevitable with population growth. Otherwise you have a good point on security.

[Omollo]

So basically kambas had a lot of cows but those cows produce very little milk per head. Destocking would have been inevitable with population growth. Otherwise you have a good point on security.

NO

You have a situation where a population is confined to a reserve and most of its land taken away and efforts being made to make beef and diary farming for white farmers productive. The prices being offered are low but the supply is still huge. The Government wants the whites to succeed and therefore come up with excuse after another. Of course by limiting the land available for grazing there would be "over-stocking" and the need for "destocking".

I think you should read about it. It no use talking to you about it here.

Note that it is not the only place this was done. The Maasai, Nandi, Pokot, Turkana etc were all subjected to this kind of sabotage. The steps taken were long term and most were continued by our educated "agricultural officers" who continued to sing the song of destocking and preaching hate against indigenous cows as being less productive than European cows. The truth as we are finding out is a little more complicated. From the so called grade hens to cows - there are indigenous species that are beating them hoof and claw down.


Here are some ninor references to destocking. Even though the author tried to be objective, he still misses out on some subtle facts. He refers to overstocking ignoring the fact that it was artificially created by limiting grazing land.