How once-profitable pyrethrum sector lost farmers and markets

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In the tropical highlands of Molo, Nakuru County, 66-year-old Mary Wambui looks at a sack of pyrethrum with little enthusiasm.

She has planted the crop on only one acre of her 12-acre farm in Turi. Her lack of enthusiasm is compounded by uncertainty over when she will be paid after the Pyrethrum Processing Company of Kenya (PPCK) collects her crop.

She is among growers who have abandoned the once-lucrative crop after years of hard labour, turning instead to alternative farming.

Production has declined sharply since 2001, and growers say delayed payments have fuelled apathy. The industry has also lost much of its regional and international market.

“Pyrethrum no longer brings in money. I plant it just for sentimental value. In fact, I uprooted the crop and started farming Irish potatoes and other crops,” the retired teacher told the Nation.

Ms Wambui recalls the 1980s, when she and her family depended solely on pyrethrum after taking it up because of its high returns.

A few metres away, 35-year-old James Maina sprays his 10-acre potato crop.

“I do not intend to ever grow pyrethrum. I have seen first-hand how my parents struggled with the crop,” he says.

Their experiences mirror those of thousands of farmers who once depended on pyrethrum, a major foreign exchange earner and source of livelihoods, before production and markets declined.

For years, small-scale farmers in villages across Subukia Sub-county depended on the crop to raise their families. But what was once a thriving enterprise has largely disappeared from farms, forcing growers to diversify.

For Allan Njoroge Kuria of Kabaazi, memories of pyrethrum’s better days remain fresh. He started growing it in 2013 after then Nakuru Governor Kinuthia Mbugua announced plans to revive the sector.

Mr Kuria said the revival programme promised to restore production, create jobs and revive the pyrethrum factory in Nakuru. The county administration targeted about 4,000 jobs in every sub-county.

He was among farmers who embraced the initiative, planting pyrethrum on his one-acre farm after receiving planting material distributed under the programme.

At the height of production, farmers supplied dried flowers to PPCK, where the crop was tested for pyrethrin content. Mr Kuria said farmers were initially paid Sh200 per kilogramme before the price rose to Sh230, attracting more growers.

Increased production led to the formation of Inama Cooperative, bringing together 62 farmers from Maombi, Muhireri, Jumatatu, Mahinga and Kendana in Subukia Valley. The cooperative was intended to strengthen farmers’ bargaining power, but its gains were short-lived.

As more buyers entered the market, growers increasingly sold directly to companies including Kentegra Biotechnology and Africhem Botanicals, weakening the cooperative.

The opening up of the market gave farmers more buyers but, Mr Kuria said, also created uncertainty over prices and payments. PPCK payments could take two or three months, while Kentegra paid within a week and some buyers paid in cash.

“The buyers suggested we divide ourselves into regions, then contract farming was introduced. PPCK would give you splits and, after harvesting, they would buy the produce. But the model was not sustainable, and farmers pulled out due to delays in payment,” he said.

Inama eventually collapsed. Farmers later regrouped to form Jumacase, bringing together growers from Jumatatu, Mahinda and Kendana Valley.

Mr Kuria said the revival programme also faltered because planting material was distributed inconsistently. Some farmers received clones from the county government, others sourced their own, while some abandoned the project.

“We were given splits, but others started sourcing clones from other sources, while some were given clones by the county government and others quit the programme,” he said.

He said the momentum weakened after Governor Mbugua left office.

Mr Kuria said his successor, Lee Kinyanjui, inherited the sector but did not allocate enough resources to it. Efforts to encourage farmers to acquire planting material from laboratories, with promises of improved varieties and higher pyrethrin content, proved expensive.

Production fell to about 4,010 metric tonnes against a projected 5,070 tonnes, with the anticipated expansion failing to materialise. Most farmers who had hoped to earn as much as Sh400 a kilogramme, depending on quality, gave up because of high production costs.

In 2022, Good People International and the Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) attempted another revival while supporting people living with disabilities. The initiative established the Subukia Pyrethrum Growers Cooperative solar dryers and greenhouse shades to improve the value chain. But marketing problems and delayed payments undermined the project.

Farmers have since embraced diversification, planting maize and avocado while retaining hopes of a sector revival.

“I was making money from a single picking. I would get 20 to 30 kilogrammes, and when I picked twice a month, I would get 40 to 60 kilogrammes. I was planting the MO13 variety, which I sourced from the Pyrethrum Board of Kenya when they were farming in Rigogo Forest. The variety has a higher pyrethrin content,” Mr Kuria said.

He believes a strong cooperative can consolidate produce, negotiate better prices, ensure collection from farms and improve timely payment.

He also wants regulators, including the Agriculture and Food Authority (AFA) and the Kenya Plant Health Inspectorate Service (KEPHIS), to play a stronger role in ensuring farmers get quality clones and access to markets without exploitation by brokers.

Ms Nancy Wambui Njoroge has also uprooted pyrethrum and switched to alternative crops to sustain her family.

On her one-acre farm, she has left a small section of pyrethrum to provide splits if she returns to the crop.

The 72-year-old grandmother inherited pyrethrum farming from her father, a renowned grower in Subukia. She said the crop was once profitable, but fluctuating prices eventually forced her out.

“I grew up seeing my father planting pyrethrum. When I took over, it was profitable; I was able to educate my children with the sale of the crop. Last year, I decided to abandon it. I was spending so much on inputs, but the returns were low,” she said.

Similar changes have occurred in Nyandarua, Bomet, Narok, Kericho, Uasin Gishu, Nyeri, Embu and West Pokot, among other growing zones.

At its height, PPCK was a beehive of activity, with its machines running daily. Today, the factory can go for months waiting for enough flowers to process.

The plant has a capacity to crush 25 tonnes of pyrethrum a day and a large storage facility, but its idle machinery and ageing trucks underscore the decline of an industry that once generated significant incomes for farmers.

A spot-check by the Nation found the factory in Nakuru City underutilised and silent for much of the time.

The decline of the former Pyrethrum Board of Kenya (PBK), which regulated and marketed the crop, coincided with claims of mismanagement and delayed payments that farmers say drove them away. They gradually switched to maize, potatoes, horticulture and dairy farming.

In the 1980s and early 1990s, Kenya was a global leader in pyrethrum production. The crop was used in natural insecticides and pesticides, while pyrethrin was used in medical and personal-care products.

At its peak, the sector supported more than 200,000 growers and millions of people through direct and indirect livelihoods. Today, the industry is a fraction of its former size.

Delayed payments, governance problems and competition from synthetic pesticides have all been cited as factors in the sector’s decline.

“The pyrethrum sector was destroyed after PBK was turned into a cash cow and stopped paying farmers on time at a fair price,” says Mr Joseph Towett, a former pyrethrum farmer in Molo. Apart from payment delays, Mr Towett said the former PBK struggled to supply farmers with critical inputs, particularly planting material.

Kenya dominated the world pyrethrum market until the 1990s, before production and its market share fell sharply in the 2000s. The opening of the pesticides and insecticides market to synthetic alternatives, alongside increased competition from producers such as India and China, further weakened Kenya’s position.

Reporting originally appeared via Nation Africa. Read the full source for additional context.