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The government has been urged to urgently move with speed and address the serious shortage of subsidized fertiliser in the North Rift region ahead of this planting season.

Speaking to the media in Eldoret yesterday, Mosop MP Abraham Kirwa attributed the crisis to high demand for the farm input by the farming community in the region.

Kirwa asked the government through the Agriculture CS Mithika Linturi to expedite the delivery of the subsidized fertilizer to save farmers from the unforeseen agony.

“There is a lot of worry from farmers’ especially those from the smallholder category over the acute shortage of fertilizer. We are urging the government should intervene by delivering the farm input for this painting programme,” said Kirwa.

The first term MP reiterated that the majority of farmers require the fertilizer to plant currently pounding the region to increase maize production.

According to Kirwa, the National Cereals and Produce Board should speed up the delivery of farm input in all maize growing areas to cope with the looming high demand.

He regretted that no measures from the concerned authorities have been put in place to make the fertilizer available in NCPB stores that are spread across the region.

“Those in-charge of the ministry of agriculture docket should come out and tell farmers what is causing the crisis instead of keeping them in suspense,” added Kirwa.

He said that small scale farmers were relying on the subsidized fertilizer from the government as they cannot pay market prices to access the commodity unlike the large scale farmers.