(AFA) will Tuesday meet miraa exporters in bid to streamline the export of the herb that has for long been unregulated.
In a letter to exporters, Miraa, Pyrethrum and other Industrial Crops Directorate head Clement Muyesu said the meeting is in line with the Miraa Taskforce Report Implementation Committee’s efforts to recover lost markets and establish new ones.
The exporters will hold a consultative meeting with government agencies at Kilimo House (Agriculture ministry headquarters) as part of the technical committee’s bid to lobby for wider markets in the region and internationally.
There are about 10 miraa exporters in the country with Somalia being the largest miraa export market, taking in about 50 tonnes of miraa daily, valued at about Sh100 million. Other export markets take about four tonnes in a week.
Miraa accounts for about 90 percent of all Kenyan exports to Somalia. Data by Kenya National Bureau of Statistics indicate that Kenya exported goods worth about Sh16 billion to Somalia last year.
Nyambene Miraa traders Association spokesman Kimathi Munjuri said that AFA is expected to enlighten exporters on licensing and standards required in export of fresh produce.
“Since miraa is a scheduled crop, it is expected that anyone dealing in miraa must be licensed by AFA. This will ensure that standards meant for export of fresh produce are adhered to from the farm to the market,” Mr Munjuri said.
He said there was need for the government to put in more resources towards improving production through water supply, ensure hygienic handling of Miraa and adherence to standards, to meet international market standards.
Recently, Trade secretary Peter Munya said the Kenya Bureau of Standards was developing standards for the crop while the ministry had included miraa in the national export strategy.
Many Kenyans accuse Somalis of being bad people but 90 percent of Kenyan exports to Somalia is drugs
Meru county is probably the most diversified county in terms of agriculture.
Fun fact. Meru is the largest producer of bananas, macadamia nuts. Securely in the top 5 largest dairy products producers. In fact, on processed milk, Meru Dairy ranks only behind Brookside, Kinangop and Githunguri dairy.
Meru is also one of the largest producers of tea and coffee in addition to producing typical abstinence foods like maize, beans etc.
In dollar terms, Meru county ranks at number 4 in terms of agricultural output at Kshs 124.8bn worth of produce a year. Miraa only contributes about 4bn.
I have a Meru friend who can only chew miraa from a few of his OWN trees, since the rest are sprayed with some chemical to make the new young shoots sprout faster.
It’s on the windward side of mt Kenya, so it definitely receives most of the rainfall, and it also has majority of the Rivers flowing out of the mountain, so it’s one of the most fertile places in Kenya.
Agree that drugs selling have to be stopped, though there are always those who consider cannabis/weed/light drugs only a drug and see it from its worse parts… they do not understand that if we legalize it everywhere then we can control the use of it… I mean, as speaking from my personal experience… My son has been using it as a painkiller in small amounts, then when the necessity has warren of he decided to use it continually. That is when he became dependent of it and when we found out we decided to try to keep him under control by doing a test every day with this advanced urine drug test dip card. That is why it should be controlled…
Thanks to this test we found out that he used amphetamine too…
So, we have to test our trusted persons sometimes…