Traders in Thika have petitioned the government to review the Irish potato regulations, saying it is designed to kick thousands of them out of business.
The traders on Wednesday said they were not consulted before the law was enacted in 2019.
Huge taxes and hefty fines proposed by the regulation will push them out of trade and into the shackles of poverty, they said.
The traders have since Monday declined to ferry potatoes to markets within the region for fear of enforcement officers.
The development has led to an acute potato crisis, with hoteliers and fast-food restaurants suffering most.
The law requires growers, transporters, dealers and processors to register with the counties, failing which they could be fined Sh5 million, jailed for three years or both.
It stipulates that potatoes must be packaged in approved clean materials that allow free flow of air, and not exceeding 50 kilos.
Traders are also required to clean and store potatoes in crates and in refrigerated places while transporting and storing the produce in the markets.
Madaraka Market traders chairperson Jane Waithera said officials in the Ministry of Agriculture were trying to implement laws only suitable for the developed countries.
“It is wrong for a few individuals to sit in offices and create laws without engaging the stakeholders. These laws will not protect farmers as they claim, it will make farmers and traders poorer than they were before,” Waithera said.
“The hefty fines and high taxes they plan to impose on us are strange. No small trader can raise such huge amounts of money.”
Waithera said that traders are aware that cartels with deep pockets, are behind the laws as they want to take control of the potato sector.
“The cartels want to enrich themselves at the expense of the farmers’ hard work and to the detriment of the small-scale traders in the country. We plead with the government to intervene and review the laws before the sector is crashed just like the tea and coffee sectors which have taken decades to get back on their feet,” she said.
The traders said their local leaders had yet to intervene in the matter, saying that the potato crisis has been given a wide berth.
“Our leaders must take this matter seriously because the whole potato sector will collapse if left unchecked and thousands of jobs are hanging in the balance,” Waithera said.
Trader Moses Njoroge said that the regulations are complicating the potato business in the country and most farmers risk losing their hard-toiled produce to rotting and rodents.
“We are not at war with the farmers. We have agreed to package the potatoes in 50kg bags which is okay with the farmers. What we are against is the other radical laws that have been introduced like washing the potatoes, refrigerating them and the hefty taxes and fines,” Njoroge said.
He said that the government should let farmers decide how to sell their produce to traders because it has not provided them with seed, fertiliser, land or any other farm input. The decision should be made by the farmer.
Farmer Mary Waithera said that she has been in the trade for more than four decades and has never witnessed such laws designed to inflict pain on them.
“Potato business has been my source of livelihood and I’m in shock and worried because such laws have come to kick us out of the trade,” she said.
Jane Wacheke and Susan Wanjiru pleaded with Ministry of Agriculture to suspend the law and review it to benefit all players in the sector.
Other businesses in Madaraka Market in Thika have felt the heat of the crisis, as customers are no longer shopping in hordes.
“Potatoes are highly consumed in many homes in this region and the moment there are no potatoes in the market we get less or no customers. We hope the government can look into the matter with urgency," a trader said.
The traders pleaded with President Uhuru Kenyatta to end the crisis.
(Edited by Bilha Makokha)
