The Government is on a quest to regulate food crops in the country . Although the national assembly has said that the law is not applicable in Kenya, the government is still pushing.
Small-scale farmers in the country are likely to face challenging times as they will be subjected to tough restrictions they must adhere to for them to be allowed to sell their produce.
Once implemented, farmers will no longer be allowed to farm besides the roads. The farmers will be required to strictly adhere to modern methods of drying grains as opposed to the traditional sun drying on the dusty roadsides.
The regulations will also subject farmers to strict observation of hygiene in storage of foods unlike the current situation where farmers are allowed to store grain on the floor of dusty stores.
Agriculture Cabinet secretary Mwangi Kiunjuri cited cases such as poor handling of food during transportation and drying of grains as some of the unhygienic situations which have exposed Kenyans to unhealthy conditions resulting from consumption of contaminated foods.
“This is a very serious conversation…as we speak, there is a bill about cancer. Now, besides cancer look at the number of diseases that are related to unhygienic conditions…these are some of the things that we want addressed in these regulations to avoid exposing Kenyans to more dangers,” the CS told the legislators in Mombasa on Monday.
Kiunjuri said bad food handling practices have on various occasions exposed Kenyans to high levels of aflatoxin, adding that it is imperative to put up measures that match the international standards of food handling.
But the Committee chairperson Gladys Shollei and Nominated MP Shamalla Jennifer argued that some of the regulations must be re-looked to avoid disenfranchising small-scale farmers.
They said if the regulations are allowed to pass on their face value, Kenyans will end up being penalised for doing no mistakes-.