Report: Kenyans now buy 80pc of the food they eat
Kariuki Gatiba, a trader, arranges groceries at Nyeri Town Market on May 3, 2023.
Kenyans are buying more than 80 per cent of the food they eat, with less than 15 per cent of the food consumed by households being what they produce, a report has revealed.
According to the Kenya Poverty Report, 2021, food purchases are highest among households living in urban areas where at least 93.5 per cent of food is bought, with Nairobi and Mombasa leading the way.
But even in rural areas, more than two-thirds of households consume purchased food, as home-grown food accounts for only one-fifth of their diet.
The report, which sheds light on the state of Kenya's agriculture, shows that in none of the 47 counties did a third of the food consumed by households come from their own production, while only in less than 10 counties did at least a quarter of the food consumed come from household production.
"Nationally, food consumed from purchases/stocks was the main source, accounting for 80.2 percent of total food consumed.
“Similarly, a significant proportion (93.5 per cent) of food consumption in urban areas was purchased. At the county level, Nairobi had the highest share of food consumption from purchases (97.1 per cent), while Elgeyo Marakwet had the lowest share (61.5 per cent),” the Kenya Poverty Report says.
The report, released by the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) earlier this month, shows that rural areas reported a higher share (20 per cent) of food consumption from own production.
Only seven counties — Elgeyo Marakwet (31.2 percent), Nyandarua (30.9 percent), Homa Bay (29.2 percent), Nandi (27.7 percent), Kisii (27.3 percent), West Pokot (26.2 percent) and Bomet (25.9 percent) — had rates of home-grown food consumption above a quarter of food consumed.
"On the other hand, Nairobi City County reported the lowest share (0.5 percent) of consumption from own production, followed by Mombasa (1.4 percent)," the report says.
With the details revealing that most households have to buy what they consume, the debate continues on the status of Kenya's agriculture — long touted as the country's economic backbone — as the country continues to increase food imports to meet demand while local production suffers.
While the report cites 2021 figures, the situation may have worsened over the past two years, when the country has faced at least five drought seasons that have affected planting for many farmers, as global supply chain disruptions have affected agricultural input prices.
“Estimated maize production decreased from 36.7 million bags in 2021 to 34.3 million bags in 2022. Similarly, tea production decreased from 537,800 tonnes in 2021 to 535,000 tonnes in 2022 due to low rainfall in tea growing areas.
“The volume of marketed milk declined from 801.9 million litres in 2021 to 754.3 million litres in 2022, largely due to drought, which led to a shortage of fodder for livestock,” the Economic Survey 2023 said.
As agricultural output has declined, the rate of food importion has risen, increasing the rate at which households have to buy what they eat. Maize imports, for example, have increased by 50 percent since 2018, reaching 793,751 tonnes last year.
Rice imports have also increased from 599,339 tonnes in 2018 to 678,088 tonnes last year.
The poverty report also found that rural households spend almost two-thirds of their income (63 per cent) on food, while urban households spend less than half (42.2 per cent) on food.
This means that despite lower incomes, rural households have to dig deeper to put food on the table, leaving many unable to meet their monthly food needs — 10.8 million of the 15.1 million Kenyans living in food poverty are from rural areas.
The details in the report come after a report by the Commission on Revenue Allocation (CRA) on counties’ own source revenue (OSR) performance in 2021, which also linked the devolved units’ heavy reliance on agriculture to poor revenues.
"Agriculture is the mainstay sector for counties that generate less than Sh200 million in OSR annually. The revenue sources available to these counties from agriculture are land rates, produce cess and livestock cess (cess accounts for only three percent of county revenue), making the OSR collection capacity of these counties limited," the CRA report said.
KNBS's 2021 Gross County Product, which looked at the contribution of counties to Kenya's wealth, found that at least 28 counties contributed less than two percent each to the total agricultural production.
The report also found that counties that relied on a diverse range of agricultural products performed better economically than those that relied on a few crops. “The top five counties in terms of agricultural production were Meru, Nakuru, Murang'a, Nandi and Nyandarua. These counties produce a wide range of agricultural products including tea, maize, vegetables, potatoes and raw milk,” it said.
