• MP holds that SFR has saved farmers by regulating imports that had turned to disadvantage them.
• Cabinet approved the disbandment and ordered a further restructuring of NCPB to take up SFR roles.
Image: FILE
The government has started disbanding the Strategic Food Reserve Fund – the entity tasked with ensuring Kenyans have sufficient food stocks.
Treasury Cabinet Secretary Ukur Yatani set the wheels in motion after publishing legislation to revoke the laws establishing the food reserve fund.
The proposed Public Finance Management (Strategic Food Reserve Trust Fund) (Revocation) Regulations, 2020, is pending approval of the National Assembly.
“The Public Finance Management (Strategic Food Reserve Fund) Regulations, 2015 are revoked,” it reads.
This, if approved, will technically send home the team led by former Wildlife Minister Noah Wekesa.
The SFR chairman on Tuesday told the Star that he was not keen on commenting on the proposed revocation of their roles.
Cabinet last month ordered the winding up of the Fund amid a spirited campaign by Agriculture CS Peter Munya.
He argued that there was no point of having SFR and National Cereals and Produce Board run as parallel entities.
Farmers are divided over the plan with some vouching for SFR to be retained ‘as it is the agency that has tamed maize cartels to an extent’.
Cherangany MP Joshua Kutuny faulted the plan, saying it “has nothing to do with parallel responsibilities”.
“…the interest is the Sh10 billion available at the Fund,” the lawmaker said, adding that they are not willing to see the disbandment of SFR.
“If it was not for the food reserve fund board, farmers would be suffering more today.”
The MP added, “Anybody attempting to merge the NCBP and the SFR is doing so in the interest of the cartels, not farmers.”
He holds that SFR has saved farmers by regulating imports that had turned to disadvantage them.
“When NCPB and maize cartels wanted to push for maize importation, it is SFR that protected the farmers,” Kutuny added.
The CS needs to be very careful because we can say he is an enemy of the farmers. The radical measures will hurt the farmers, he said.
But some farmers welcomed the publication of the regulation, saying it will end the confusion in the maize sector.
Kenya Farmers Association director Kipkorir Menjo said the CS is “simply transferring the function to NCPB”.
“What we shall be keen on is the restructuring of the cereals board,” he said.
He reasoned that the cereals board has been buying maize on behalf of the SFR, which he said was only holding the money.
“They (SFR) don’t have their own stores, no personnel…they use cereals personnel to buy and dispose of produce.”
Menjo added that NCPB can now focus on its social function – building strategic reserves; and commercial function – buying and selling to millers at an appropriate time.
Farmers complained that the SFR model paved the way to briefcase millers to access maize sold to the fund.
“We want an efficient system in place; one that protects the interest of the farmer at the end of the day,” Menjo said, rooting for zero leakage of finances.
Regulations state that on being wound up, funds in the SFR Fund will be deposited to the Exchequer accounts.
“The other assets shall be transferred to the Agriculture ministry,” the regulations read.
SFR was tasked with ensuring the rotation of stocks at the strategic food reserves, fundraising, and monitoring grain market prices.
Their other work was to ensure food is of quality standards along the Strategic Food Reserve supply chain.
Wekesa’s team also determined the optimal SFR stocks and liaised with counties to ensure they were food secure.
There will be a National Food Reserve system which will procure receipts through competitive commercial processes.
The system will be using the Warehouse Receipt System, in what Cabinet says will help avoid market distortions.
The cereals board, on the other hand, will also be restructured - by legislation, into two divisions namely National Food Reserve and NCPB Trading.
Edited by R.Wamochie