This archive report was first published on 3 October 2019.
Erastus Muriuki's journey to becoming a successful tomato farmer began in 1994, when he started his agribusiness with Sh3,000 in Kirinyaga.
Having worked as a farmhand on a farm belonging to an agriculture officer in the county for over five years, Muriuki believed he had the knowledge to start his own venture.
He had saved the money from his Sh20 daily pay, which he earned soon after sitting his KCPE exams in 1987.
Muriuki's grandmother offered him a quarter-acre where he planted his first crop, and he was keen to see everything go right, ensuring that he applied well-composed animal manure, chemical fertiliser, and sprayed them with chemicals to curb pests, just as his boss was doing.
That season, the budding farmer pocketed Sh10,000 in profit, selling a kilo of tomatoes at Sh60, which he considered a good price.
By 2005, Muriuki had leased up to 20 acres to grow tomatoes, but he later scaled down his activities for better management and now farms on seven-and-a-half acres.
He owns one-and-a-half acre and has leased the six at Sh5,000 each, and does two seasons per year, employing eight workers.
Muriuki grows hybrid Bolgan F1 and Perseo F1 types of tomatoes, with a packet of 5,000 seeds going for Sh14,000, and an acre hosts 10,000 plants.
He starts by planting the seeds in a nursery for about a month before he transfers them to the main field, and says tomatoes have a strong root system and do best in light soils, which should be well-drained and prepared to a fine tilth.
Emmah Wanjiru Mwenda, an agronomist with H.M Clause, a seed firm, advises that tomatoes need inter-row spacing of 140cm and 25cm from one plant to the next, and for higher yields, tomatoes need sufficient water and proper farm management.
Muriuki's production cost per acre amounts to Sh300,000 per season, but he fetches over twice the amount when the crop does well, with most of the money going on expenses such as seeds, fertiliser, pesticides, and labour.
He sells his produce to traders at Githurai, Marikiti, and Kangemi markets, and says the diseases he grapples with include bacterial leaf spot, bacterial wilt, and fusarium wilt, as well as pests like cutworms, white flies, thrips, aphids, and Tuta absoluta.
