Under a baking sun in the northwestern Kenyan village of Kiminini, Christine Musiasia grabbed a bunch of freshly chopped feed – a mix of tropical Rhodes grass and protein-rich desmodium and calliendra crops – and brought it to her four animals. The two milking cows and two heifers rushed to the troughs. One year ago, they produced just enough milk for the family. This year, they are netting Christine a steady cash income.
“I used to take my cows along the road,” Christine told the Irish Farmers Journal. Skinny Kenyan cattle are often seen grazing on patchy grass verges or even trash, while farmers focus on growing maize – a crop in high demand in Kenya, but one vulnerable to drought, pests and price volatility.
In just 12 months, Christine’s farm has changed radically. She has ditched maize for a mix of fodder and food crops, used AI for the first time and built a simple but efficient housing unit for her cows. She dumps their manure into a small anaerobic digester which gives her cooking gas and nutrient-rich slurry. The farm supports Christine, her husband and six children, and two farm workers. “I also have more free time,” she says.
One of her neighbours, John Wakeli, has also started to grow fodder crops for his two goats and two in-calf heifers. “This is the first time we have cattle,” he said. “We will start milking soon.”
Another local farmer, Nathan Rono, made similar changes and proudly showed his milk dockets of the past year. From under five litres, his daily deliveries have grown to above 11 litres.
These are some of the 30,000 family farms targeted by the Livelihoods Mt Elgon project, which kicked off last year to develop dairying in this region over the next decade – all from private sector resources. VI Agroforestry, a farm support organisation operating across East Africa, is training farmers into new technologies and providing seeds for the new crops.
Listen to an interview with VI Agroforestry deputy regional director Wangu Mutua in our podcast below:
Finance comes under the form of a €3.5m investment from the Livelihoods Carbon Fund, an investment body for multinationals looking to achieve social impact and offset their greenhouse gas emissions.
Sustainable farming practices will avoid the emission of 1m tonnes of CO2 through sequestration in soils and increased cow efficiency
“There are three main benefits to the Livelihoods Mt Elgon project: the first one is its positive impact on the lives of farmers and their families, starting with increased and more stable revenues over time. The second is the additional milk produced for Brookside, contributing to more economic activity. And the last one is climate action as sustainable farming practices will avoid the emission of 1m tonnes of CO2 through sequestration in soils and increased cow efficiency,” said Livelihoods Venture president and co-founder Bernard Giraud.
The French dairy giant Danone is a major player here: it was the first investor in the Livelihoods Funds and owns 40% of Brookside Dairies, the largest milk processor in Kenya. The other 60% belongs to the Kenyatta family of the first and current presidents of Kenya.
Brookside has committed to buying all the milk from the farmers involved in the project for the next ten years as long as it meets quality criteria. Kenyan consumers are spending more and more on dairy products and the company can barely meet the demand for its liquid milk, yoghurt, cream, butter and ghee.
“We have an installed capacity of 1.5m litres/day, but we process between 300,000 and 800,000l/day,” said Emmanuel Kabaki, Brookside’s head of milk procurement and extension services. The drought that hit east Africa in the past year curtailed milk supply. Importing is not an option as it would attract a 60% tariff. A new drier built to transform any oversupply into milk powder remains idle.
“This year, a bonus had to be paid. It’s challenging,” Kabaki said, even though Brookside trains 20,000 farmers each year to increase productivity. According to Kabaki, most Kenyan dairy farmers milk one to three cows on 3ac to 5ac, with the average daily yield just six litres/cow.
Brookside is offering co-ops in the Mt Elgon project its current top price of 35c/l on one-year fixed-price contracts, investing in their bulk tanks and dispatching staff for maintenance and quality control. The company hopes to lift its daily collection from the area from 5,000 litres to 135,000 litres.
Co-ops are a key link in this emerging value chain, and 15 of them are involved in this project. During the Irish Farmers Journal’s visit to Mubere, farmers brought their milk and staff offloaded creamery cans from local collection points. A Brookside employee performed density and alcohol tests before accepting deliveries into the 3,000-litre communal bulk tank. The scene was reminiscent of Ireland 60 years ago.
Mubere Dairy Farmers’ Co-operative Society started informally in 2009 but registered as a co-op just two months ago. It is targeting 3,000 registered members and more than 3,000 litres/day in collection by the end of this year. It secured a government grant to fund its bulk tank and received assistance from VI Agroforestry to establish sound governance– a key point after many Kenyan dairy co-ops collapsed 30 years ago, exposing farmers to heavy losses.
“People had lost faith in the co-op movement with the mismanagement of the 1980s,” said project manager Edward Masinde. “We’re bringing them back.”
Of the 35c/l paid by Brookside, Mubere co-op keeps 3c/l to pay its eight staff and other costs. Farmers get 32c/l in cash, bank wire or mobile phone transfer – a common form of payment in Kenya. To become members, suppliers buy a €5 share. The co-op has weathered the recent drought well and volumes are picking up again, allowing it to set money aside.
“We want to buy our own premises,” said its chair Robert Makhanu. “We will also start a health service with a vet available,” he added.
The farmers taking part in the Mt Elgon project are transforming their maize-only farms into dense patchworks of crops designed for maximum yield. On just 1.5ac, John Wakeli grows green beans between maize rows, fodder and protein crops, bananas and sweet potatoes, a combination of trees controlling soil nutrients, moisture and erosion while providing firewood and timber, and a few coffee bushes. He also keeps rabbits, laying hens, and has a nursery with dozens of seedlings. This is a reminder that a farm’s main pasture or tillage production area always leave gaps – however tiny – to pack in additional sources of output and income.
Reporting supported by the Simon Cumbers Media Fund.