This archive report was first published on 5 August 2020.
Kenya's smallholder farmers are facing unprecedented challenges due to the Covid-19 pandemic, which has strained food production systems and destabilised the economy.
Adverse weather patterns and desert locusts have further exacerbated production losses, leaving many farmers without the means to acquire essential inputs for the next season.
President Kenyatta's eight-point economic stimulus programme, which includes a Sh3 billion subsidy for farm inputs through e-vouchers, is a valuable policy intervention that could create incentives for adopting high-quality inputs and increase food production.
However, the programme targets only 200,000 of the country's four million smallholder farmers, leaving millions of deserving beneficiaries without access to support.
As a key constituency that labours every day to meet Kenya's food needs, smallholders require a responsive and fit-for-purpose model that provides them with access to credit and subsidies.
Traditionally, subsidies have been effective in incentivising food production by driving down prices to benefit farmers and consumers. The government could be more ambitious in its objective, aiming to raise the average incomes of smallholders by 35 per cent and directly benefit more than 3.3 million farming households.
Fortunately, despite the scale of Covid-19 responses required, Kenya is not without options. The government can partner with stakeholders in the food value chain to actualise an effective national response in the interest of food security.
One such option is to partner with financial service providers, like banks and microfinance institutions, to provide seed and fertiliser on affordable credit.
As the government balances the need to protect the country's health while keeping the economy going, approaches that support all smallholder farmers, not just a few, must be an essential part of the Covid-19 mitigation.
— Mr Maritim is a government relations senior analyst at One Acre Fund.
