Foreign markets have shut their doors to livestock from Garissa due to over-use and misuse of antibiotics by pastoralists.
Speaking during a stakeholders sensitization workshop on Friday,
County Agriculture executive Issa Yarrow said on Friday that a study had exposed high levels of veterinary drug residues in sampled animals from the region.
Yarrow, who was addressing a stakeholders' sensitisation workshop, said that was why Middle East livestock importers were no longer interested in animals from the region.
Farmers are increasing feeding animals with antibiotics to keep them healthy driven by high demand for beef and mutton.
"Scientific evidence has clearly demonstrated that overuse of antibiotics in animals can contribute to the emergence of antibiotic resistance in humans. So we need, as stakeholders, to know what drugs we are giving to our animals and what our herders are doing on the ground," Yarrow said.
The stakeholders were sensitised on the role of the private sector in animal health delivery and prudent management of veterinary pharmaceuticals.
Livestock is the economic mainstay of the pastoralists of northern Kenya.
Kenya Livestock Marketing Council chairman Dubat Amey says pastoralists have never earned maximum benefits from the livestock due to, among other reasons, failure by both the national and county governments to plan for the sector.
