The proposed tea sector regulations will motivate farmers and help revamp the dwindling tea sector farming Hon Godfrey Osotsi has said.
The Amani National Congress released the statement below to newsrooms heaping praises on Cs Munya for the timely steps.
PERSONAL STATEMENT ON THE PROPOSED TEA SECTOR REGULATIONS BY MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE
I want to take this earliest opportunity to congratulate the Ministry of Agriculture and particularly the Cabinet Secretary Hon Peter Munya for coming up with draft tea sector regulations as part of the efforts to enhance efficiency, accountability and productivity in the tea sector. The proposed raft of measures will benefit the small scale tea farmers who have continued to suffer due to inefficiencies and corruption in the tea sector. I am particularly impressed by the proposals to: improve the operations and automation of the tea auction in mombasa; improvement in bonus payment process (50% of the delivery to be paid monthly and the rest to be paid as bonus on monthly basis); individual factories to sell their produce directly at the auction; buyers of green tea leaf to deposit 10% down payment and balance to be paid before export of the product; reviewing of KTDA role and powers in the tea value chain; elimination of multiple brokers (e.g. a single broker to represent a maximum of 15 factories) among other measures.
The draft regulations which shall be subjected to public participation in due course before gazettement captures many of the views raised by members of parliament during the recent debate on Tea Bill sponsored by Kericho Senator Hon Aaron Cheruyoit. The bill will be coming up for committee of the whole House and third reading in due course. The said tea bill proposes to create Tea Board of Kenya as the sector regulator hence effectively abolishing the highly inefficient multi-sectorial regulator, AFFA. My expectation is that the proposed regulations shall complement the provisions of the Tea bill once it enacted into law and should not be used to stiffle genuine demands to abolish the moribund AFFA that has failed tea, sugar and coffee sectors.
I am confident that parliament through the delegated legislation committee shall expeditiously approve the new regulations once they are gazetted in line with Statutory Instruments Act.
I encourage farmers across the country to fully participate in the public participation process that will run for the next 14 days via written submissions and memoranda. The new rules promise to create fresh hope, accountability and efficiency for the benefit of the farmer.
Thank you.
Hon Godfrey Osotsi, MP
