Cabinet Secretary Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock Development Mithika Linturi said the Ministry of Agriculture in collaboration with relevant state agencies and the County Governments has formed a multi-agency team whose mandate is to collect geo-location or geo-coordinates for all the coffee farms, estates and coffee cooperatives in all the 33 coffee growing counties.
He said the multi-agency team comprising of Kenya Forest Service (KFS), Wildlife Research and Training Institute (WRTI), Kenya Water Tower Agency (KWTA), and Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) will provide secondary data on forests and tree cover, wildlife protected areas and conservancies, and water towers respectively.
Further, the CS highlighted that the multi-agency team will deploy field ground surveys to collect GPS coordinates using GPS gadgets, satellite image interpretation and analysis to determine the coverage of coffee farms/estates in the targeted counties.
‘’The Regional Centre for Mapping of Resources for Development (RCMRD) is coordinating the compilation of existing geographic vector data and Kenya Space Agency (KSA) for satellite imaging and space systems.’’ CS added
Responding on the budgetary allocation for maintaining a comprehensive and accessible data base of the geolocation data for land under coffee production, CS Linturi informed the Senate that currently there is no budget allocation.
However, the Cabinet Secretary for Agriculture and Livestock Development, the Cabinet Secretary for National Treasury and Economic Planning, the Cabinet Secretary for Cooperatives and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMES) Development, the Cabinet Secretary for Foreign and Diaspora Affairs and the Attorney General have developed a joint Cabinet Memo to be presented to the Cabinet on the European Union regulation requirements.
Linturi said that the memo seeks Cabinet approval for budgetary allocation of Ksh. 416,636,000.00 towards collection of Geodatabase for all coffee growers, coffee farm, cooperatives, estates and processing factories in Kenya to facilitate preparation of due diligence statements.
Responding on question raised by Senator Danson Mungatana on the Government plans to compensate Tana River farmers for the losses suffered during floods, CS said Government has no budgetary allocation for the purpose of compensation of farmers affected by floods.
Answering to the question by Senator Joyce Korir on Meat safety and Value addition in slaughterhouse, CS Linturi elaborated that Government implements the requirements of the Fourth Schedule of Constitution of Kenya on distribution of functions between the National Government and the County Governments.
‘’The National Government develops veterinary policies which are implemented by county governments to assure meat safety. In addition, the national government offers capacity building and technical assistance to the counties.’’Linturu alluded.
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