Kenya Agricultural products & Opportunities in agriculture
Kenya's agriculture is sufficiently diversified to produce nearly all of the nation's basic foodstuffs. To some extent, Kenya also helps feed neighboring countries.
Kenya is Africa's leading tea producer, and was fourth in the world in 1999, behind India, China, and Sri Lanka. Black tea is Kenya's leading agricultural foreign exchange earner. Production in 1999 reached 220,000 tons. Tea exports were valued at $404.1 million in 2001, or nearly 18% of total exports. The tea industry is divided between small farms and large estates. The small-scale sector, with more than 260,000 farmers, is controlled by the parastatal Kenya Tea Development Authority. The estates, consisting of 60–75
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Smallholders grow most of the corn and also produce significant quantities of potatoes, beans, peas, sorghum, sweet potatoes, cassava, bananas, and oilseeds.
Kenya, is offering immense business opportunities in the agricultural sector, it’s the apt time to seize the opportunities. Some of the business ideas and opportunities in Kenya are:-
Agriculture and Food Processing
Agriculture is the mainstay of the economy, providing livelihood to approximately 75 per cent of the population. There is considerable scope for diversification and expansion of the agricultural sector through accelerated food crop production, processing and marketing.
There are also opportunities for improvement in technological infrastructure such as packaging, storage, and transportation. Intensified irrigation and additional value added processing are areas for investments.
Horticulture
The horticultural sector is one of the fastest growing sectors in the economy and is the second largest foreign exchange earner after tea. Opportunities exist in production and export of products such as cut-flowers, French beans, pineapples, mushrooms, asparagus, mangoes, macadamia nuts, avocados, passion fruits, melons, and
Kenya is in a malnourished area, so the farmers should sell their produce more locally for better improvements
Agriculture plays an enormous part in having a functioning society. The farming fields in the
Somalia is one of the world’s poorest and least developed countries (Campbell). Because of the Civil War, which broke out in 1991, much of Somalia’s economy has been devastated. The war left many homeless and drove them to raise livestock as a means of survival. The economy used to be based on exports of cattle, goats, and bananas but as of early 1992 much of the economic trade had come to a halt. Now the economy is primarily based on the raising of livestock, which accounts for 40% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) (Alhaus). Due to overgrazing, soil erosion, and the clearing away of many trees, Somalia has very few natural resources, which have not been exploited.
Onwueme, I. C., Sinba, T. D. (1991). Field crops production in Tropical Africa. Principles and practices.CTA, Ede, The Netherlands publishers (480pp), 265-275.
The situation became even more complex when the British colonial administration introduced a currency-based income tax system. For centuries, the Kenyan economy had largely rested on the exchange of livestock and other goods. With this in mind, it should come as little su...
1990 Becoming Kenyans: Socio-economic transformation of the pastoral Maasai (Drylands research series), Acts Press, pp. 193-201
Kenya is a very important country in the world basically due to its strategic location in the East African region. It is a country that has had an interesting political walk that despite the challenges it has faced, it has managed to pull through though with an interesting history to tell. There have been different regimes in the country since it acquired its independence. Worth noting is that these regimes have come into power through different ideologies and they have guided the country in different directions. The country was colonized by the British and acquired its independence in the year 1963. Notably, Kenya is considered to have been a colonial invention which had to contend with the colonialists.
Kenya is a developing country in East Africa region with a total land area of 582,646 km2. It gained independence in 1963 from British colonial rule. It is neighbor to Somalia and Sudan which have experienced political instability marred with civil strife but the country has remained relatively stable despite the effects of such on socio-economic status of the country. According to Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (2010), Kenya has 38.6 million people with a growth rate of 2.8% annually with a majority population living in rural areas (World Bank, 2010). Under its current constitution (promulgated in 2010), Kenya is headed by a president with a devolved county government system comprising of 47 counties. Its last concluded general elections in 2013 were peaceful compared to the conflicted 2007 that sparked violence in the country.
The main source of income for Kenya comes from agriculture. Coffee and tea are the most valuable crops. Together they account for approximately 50 per cent of all forigien exchange earnings. Because of the rapidly growing population, Kenya now imports large quantities of food, praticularly wheat. Unemployment is high. Expecally in the urban areas.
Public disconnection from agriculture has created a resistance that stands to undo generations of progress. Most people are not aware that the world population is expected to climb to 9.8 billion people by 2050. To accommodate this growth, 70% more food will need to be produced. I believe this can only be accomplished with further
As agriculture has become more intensive, farmers have become capable of producing higher yields using less labour and less land. Growth of the agriculture has not, however, been an unmixed blessing. It, like every other thing, has its pros and cons. Topsoil depletion, groundwater contamination, the decline of family farms, continued neglect of the living and working conditions for farm labourers, increasing costs of production, and the disintegration of economic and social conditions in rural communities. These are the cons of the new improved agriculture.
The implications for food security in the longer term are twofold. On the other hand, a structural transformation of agriculture has to be installed, for example, through the emergence of technological inputs, or land tenure reform to raise yields. On the other hand, provided with inherent vulnerability of agriculture, the keys of agriculture in the economy must eventually be cut to a minimal number by significantly improving growth in other sector (Befekadu and Berhanu,
...le agricultural industry. One that challenges the stigma that farming in underdeveloped countries have low productivity despite their high efficiency.
...earch and extension, rural infrastructure, and market access for small farmers. Rural investments have been sorely neglected in recent decades, and now is the time to reverse this trend. Farmers in many developing countries are operating in an environment of inadequate infrastructure like roads, electricity, and communications; poor soils; lack of storage and processing capacity; and little or no access to agricultural technologies that could increase their profits and improve their livelihoods. Recent unrest over food prices in a number of countries may tempt policymakers to put the interests of urban consumers over those of rural people, including farmers, but this approach would be shortsighted and counterproductive. Given the scale of investment needed, aid donors should also expand development assistance to agriculture, rural services, and science and technology.
The history of Kenya is like other African countries because they had ivory that European countries wanted. In the 19th century, Christian missionaries arrived from Europe, the Berlin Conference divided Africa into spheres of influence, and in 1890 Kenya was declared a British protectorate. In 1893, coffee was introduced to Kenya. In the 1920 Kenya was declared a British colony but from 1952-1956 a state of emergency was declared in response to the Mau Mau rebellion against the British. After the rebellion, in 1963, Kenya gained their independence from Britain. A year later Kenya became a republic and Wilson Kipurgut wins the first Olympic medal for ...