•Outa, who announced that he will not be defending his seat said he will work with young people to develop seeds for rice farmers.
• Outa said as he's fully 'back' from politics, he will work with farmers to revive the sector. He helped revive the sector before he joined politics.
Image: FAITH MATETE
Bye-bye politics — at least for now.
Kisumu Senator Fred Outa has taken leave of politics to venture into rice farming within Ahero Irrigation Scheme to help farmers.
Outa. who announced he will not be defending his seat last week, said he will work with young people to produce the right seeds for rice farmers.
He was speaking on Thursday last week when he closed a workshop in Kisumu. It was organised by USAID to study youth employment.
Agriculture is devolved and production is low in the area, as rice farmers say the county government as abandoned them despite the problems they gave.
They are study with paddy in their stores and that of the National Irrigation Board. They battle bird invasions an face low prices.
Outa said he wants to help revive the sector.
Before he ventured into politics on returning from the United States in 2005, he helped revive the sector.
During that period, rice production rose, he said, and farmers had a ready market.
"Before I joined politics, I worked with rice farmers in Ahero," Outa said.
"That was my project because the scheme had collapsed. I revived it with the help of other partners so farmers were making a profit."
As he leaves politics, he said, he plans to "go back there to help those rise farmers by identifying the right seeds that they are missing so they can have high yields to meet market challenges."
The 'nightmare' market in Uganda pays low prices yet they take all the paddy and farmers miss a lot in the value chain.
The senator said he supports former Chief Administrative Secretary for the EAC Ken Obura for governor because he has a strong manifesto in agriculture to help revive the rice sector.
The Kenya National Bureau of Statistics says the population is about 53.7 million, of which 60 per cent are youth and 41 per cent are unemployed.
The situation has been worsened by Covid and by more youths released into the job market annually from colleges and universities.
USAID tasked youths groups from seven subcounties to come up with business models to unlock potential in young people.
Both youth groups in Muhoroni and Nyando picked agribusiness. Senator Outa promised to partner with them to help revive rice farming and improve the sector while providing many jobs.
He urged young people not to shun farming but adopt it so they can change the trend in which most young people look for scarce white collar jobs.
Kenya spent Sh25 billion to import rice in 2020, according to Mary Mutembei from state department of in the Agriculture ministry and head of rice promotion.
In early February, Mutembe told the media Kenya is importing ias much as 80 per cent of its rice, mainly from Pakistan and other Asian counties.
Kenya produces only 15 to 20 per cent of its rice, she said.
The Agriculture ministry said Kenya produced 190,000 metric tonnes of paddy in 2020, against a demand of 1,050,000 metric tonnes.
The per capita rice consumption has also doubled from 12kg in 2016 to 25.3kg in 2020, Mutembei as she raised concerns that the government faces huge challenges in meeting
(Edited by V. Graham)