Farmers who bought fake or substandard fertiliser face huge losses after Agriculture CS Mithika Linturi remained non-committal on the compensation framework despite President William Ruto’s directive.
Appearing before Senate Committee on Agriculture probing the fake fertiliser matter, he said the affected farmers will be compensated with top dressing fertiliser at an additional fee.
“We want farmers who took the substandard fertiliser to take back the fertiliser they took then we will rework the money we haven’t paid to Kel Chemicals,” he said.
The development comes after Linturi told the committee 3,000 bags of fertiliser distributed by Kel Chemicals were substandard.
“The agreed standard of the nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium percentage is what went short of the agreed standards. That does not mean that the fertiliser was completely useless or fake,” Linturi told the senators.
The government had distributed 2.4 million bags of fertiliser as at April 4 through the National Cereals and Produce Board (NCPB).
NCPB contracted 11 companies to distribute the subsidised fertiliser.
He said if they can recover the expense and with the money they owe the company, then they will give the farmers free fertiliser.
"If it doesn’t meet, then we will work a formula to see whether they will pick the fertiliser at a lower cost,” the CS said.
Linturi’s assertions triggered fire in the committee, with the senators demanding that farmers be compensated with top dressing fertiliser at no additional fee.
The lawmakers questioned the compensation framework if at all farmers will be forced to buy the top-dressing fertiliser from NCPB at an additional cost.
“The President was very clear that farmers should be compensated. Compensation cannot come at an extra cost. Who will benefit from this extra cost they are paying yet they were given substandard fertiliser?” committee chairman James Murango posed.
Last week, Ruto ordered compensation of all farmers who bought fake fertiliser.
"Every farmer will get the correct fertiliser. Those few people who want to take advantage of food production, the company that was involved, should compensate farmers who bought fake fertiliser and they should be given new fertilisers free of charge," he said.
Details emerged that Kel Chemicals dispatched 69,070 bags to the NCPB stores.
NCPB managing director Joseph Kimote told senators that they sold 64,374 bags of fertiliser on behalf of the firm, with Sh170 million funds remitted to the firm within days.
“NCPB had practiced due diligence and if there were issues with standards it was the prerogative of the manufacturer. It is the mandate of the Kenya Bureau of Standards to check on quality of what is manufactured and distributed across the country,” the MD said.
Linturi said his ministry has no additional budget to compensate farmers hence they will bear the additional cost should the remaining money owed to Kel Chemical fall short of the total compensation.
According to the Ministry of Agriculture, only 3,000 bags of fertiliser were substandard but a spot check by senators showed a possibility of extra bags.
In Nandi and Embu counties, 4,680 bags of fertiliser were substandard despite assertion by CS Linturi that only 3,000 bags didn’t meet the set parameters.
“We are not going to pay the remaining monies for Kel Chemicals until investigation are concluded. There’s no cause for alarm until the investigations are done,” the Agriculture CS said.
Senators queried how substandard fertiliser was dispatched to NCPB stores.
They also took Linturi to task over his assertion that there were only 3,000 bags of substandard fertiliser, telling him that during their trip across the country, they had found out that there were thousands of bags of fake fertilisers in the possession of farmers.
Kimote said they were working with SBL Manufacturers on strictly commercial agency basis where on selling its product to farmers, NCPB gets a commission with 150,000 bags distributed and a payment of Sh28 million made to the state agency.
SBL director Josiah Kariuki said he was not involved in fertiliser subsidy programme, which was being claimed by African Uncensored CEO John-Allan Namu.
He said he does not own any factory at Kariandusi but they had contract with African Diatomite for them to distribute the product.