Rice imports: Officials should restore hope for Kenyan farmers
By Mathani wa Kaboi, August 4, 2025It is said that there is always an easy solution to every problem – neat, plausible and wrong.
Nothing illustrates this better than the recent decision by the government to allow duty-free imports of 500,000 metric tonnes of rice at a time when local rice farmers, particularly in the Mwea Irrigation Scheme, are stuck with their produce.
The government explains that this action is to cover the deficit in local production and consumption.
This sounds plausible at face value, but is wrong upon scrutiny. Rice imports are a continuous activity throughout the year to cover the deficit.
The problem is when the government, at the whim of sector cartels and State capture actors, allows duty-free rice imports.
This precipitate influx of cheap and often substandard rice in the Kenyan market substantially undermines the offloading by farmers of local produce.
Mwea, being an over 20 billion rice-sector reliant economy, suffers this reckless, heartless and insensitive decision.
The farmers are subjected to loss-making and hopelessness, and with it persists the challenge of rice self-deficiency.
If the government wants to walk the talk about rice self-sufficiency, it must put its money where its mouth is.
It must listen to Kirinyaga county leaders such as Senator Kamau Murango, Mwea MP Mary Maingi, community leader Wangechi Warui and others who have called for the immediate revocation of the edict on the duty-free rice imports.
In the long term, stakeholders must seek to build consensus on the enactment of the Rice Bill, which is the panacea to the modern and age-old challenges facing rice farmers in the country, and more so in Mwea Irrigation Scheme.
Knee-jerk reactions every time a problem rears its ugly head only serve short-term political ends while the farmers continue to suffer.
Mathani wa Kaboi is a political scientist and public policy research analyst in Kirinyaga County