• They rather have money than gifts they can't use. Like a rabbit abattoir when they don't rear rabbits, milk coolers when they don't produce enough milk.
• Governments and NGOs often donate useless gifts, like a potato-cooling room for farmers who rather sell fast to brokers with trucks.
Image: KNA
Smallholder farmers in Nakuru are saying thanks but no thanks to well-meaning but useless white elephant donations.
They have appealed to the government to carry out needs assessments and feasibility studies before accepting donations of items such as milk coolers and rabbit abattoirs.
They don't produce enough milk and hardly any rabbits.
The chairman of smallholder farmers in Nakuru Benard Mwenje Ngige said he has watched with amazement over the years as white elephant donations, or impractical gifts, lie idle.
He said the county was dotted with donations from the government and NGOs that were unusable because the donors never consulted the farmers about what they needed.
Mwenje cited an example of a modern rabbit abattoir that was constructed by the government at Gilgil town. During the handover ceremony, farmers applauded. Even if they criticised it, nothing would have changed.
They don't raise enough rabbits for it to be practical.
Image: KNA
“As the chairman, I set out to encourage farmers to rear rabbits and ran helter-skelter to Egerton University and other intuitions trying to get them for the farmers, " Mwenje sad.
"But none was capable of supplying on a large scale. The few they had were for teaching or student projects," he said.
He said since the abattoir was ready for use, he encouraged farmers to rear rabbits. Then he realised most farmers considered such a venture little boys' work but children were busy at school.
He also found out a number of residents had negative perceptions of rabbit meat due to strongly ingrained religious beliefs.
Mwenje called it a "wonderful project but the cart was put before the horse".
What was needed, he said, was to change farmers' attitudes about rearing rabbits, which would take more than a month. And then they needed enough rabbits to rear. Only then would they want an abattoir.
He regretted such a massive investment was just rotting away since to date farmers haven’t reared rabbits. Soon the building might have to be destroyed since it was serving no purpose.
Mwenje said he was saddened by the arbitrary donation of milk coolers and egg incubators. Officials and politicians never checked out whether the area produced enough milk to require a cooler.
“Instead of giving milk coolers, please first donate cows or heifers to the farmers, teach them modern management, provide feed, and only then will the coolers serve the intended purpose,” he said.
Another white elephant, the farmers' chairman said, was the potato cooling room built at Kivunja at Molo subcounty to assist farmers to store their potatoes as they await prices to increase.
It has never been used.
No feasibility study was done to establish the size of the potato harvest per season from small farms of two to five acres.
“A number of our potato farmers sell their produce to middlemen at the farms as they harvest them because there are lorries ready to carry and make payments instantly.
"Why will a farmer with 10 sacks incur an expense of transporting to the cooler, that might be many miles away?” he asked.
However, Mwenje said much as they appreciated the government and donors’ good intentions, they were concerned over the continued dishing out of unwanted or unusable gifts.
The money would have made a huge difference in their lives, he said.
He urged the donors to appreciate that farmers are intelligent enough to know what they want.
Random and illogical donations didn't make farmers look silly but they mocked the donor who built an abattoir, for example, before finding out whether it was needed.
Mwenje urged the county governments to change the sad scenario of white elephant donations by first consulting real farmers and not middlemen who seldom farm.
Also, he claimed banks have carried the waste to another level by promising farmers’ heaven but leaving them with huge loans that they cannot service.
“The agents they send to villages have never practised farming, and after convincing farmers to take loans, they start deducting payments instantly. Which crop matures and gets harvested in a month?” he asked.
He urged banks that were willing to assist farmers to first establish how long it takes crops to mature, be harvested and prepared for sale.
Otherwise, the current scenario was a theatre of the absurd where farmers use the same money they have been lent to repay the loans. Then they look for more money to pay interest rates that are beyond their capacity.
(Edited by V. Graham)