Winstone Chiseremi @Wchiseremi 

William Mutai, a large-scale maize and wheat farmer in North Rift region is a worried man a few weeks to the start of the main planting season in April.

Mutai’s worry is aggravated by flooding of local markets with fake agro-chemical products, some imported from Uganda through the porous Western Kenya border. 

He is among hundreds of farmers grappling with how to identify genuine farm inputs from counterfeits being sold in the region by stockists and dealers.

Worse, some of the dealers are not even registered by the Pesticides Control Board of Kenya  (PCBK) yet they are merchandising the fake products at exorbitant prices. 

“We are at a loss as who to trust because nearly all dealers and stockists operating in this region are exposing us to counterfeits, putting us at risk of losing our crops worth millions of shillings,” lamented Mutai.

He was speaking during a sensitisation forum for farmers organised by an agro-chemical multinational Corteva, at an Eldoret hotel recently. 

The meeting drew participants from maize and wheat growing counties of North Rift Region.

Unscrupulous dealers 

The one-day meeting was also attended by representatives from the farming community, Agricultural Chemical Association, county security agencies, civil society groups and the county administration.

At the highly charged forum, enraged farmers expressed concern over the rampant cases of sales of counterfeits farm products by unscrupulous dealers.

Belfast Sang, chairman of Moisoy Farmers Union, said the rogue dealers had devised ways of selling fake agro-chemical products using forged labels, which confuses both growers and livestock keepers. 

During the forum, farmers came out with a raft of resolutions to weed out the illegal trade in agro-chemical products by unscrupulous dealers. 

Going forward, all companies handling pesticides products will not be allowed to operate in the region unless they are registered with the relevant boards such as the PCBK 

The farmers resolved to close down business premises dealing in counterfeits products to supplement the government’s efforts in the fight against fake agro-chemical products.

The farmers said no shop that deals in pesticide products would be allowed to operate unless inspected and certified by PCBK and are members of the  Agricultural Chemical Association.  

The farmers also vowed to arrest and hand over to the police station any dealer, stockiest and supplier found selling the products and yet they are not authorised to deal with the agro-chemical products.

To check flooding of scrupulous dealers in agro-chemical business, the farmers vowed to root out traders who are not members of AAK. 

“We have resolved to implement the resolutions as part of our commitment to check infiltration of counterfeit products that have flooded the local markets resulting in poor harvests,” said Philip Barno.

Corteva agro-chemical Company’s East, South and Central Africa Sales Manager Francis Karanja said an awareness campaign would be rolled out in counties mapped out as maize and wheat growing areas to educate the farmers on how to differentiate fake pesticides from genuine ones.

He said the move was informed by numerous complaints by farmers over sale of fake agricultural chemicals in the local markets by unscrupulous dealers and suppliers.

“Majority of farmers have no idea how to identify fake products being sold to them by stockist and dealers,” said Karanja.

Last month, a multi-agency team arrested three suspects at an Eldoret estate after seizing a consignment of Sh15 million worth of counterfeits pesticides.

Acting on a tip off, the team under the command of Uasin Gishu County Police Commander Johnstone Ipara impounded the consignment destined for distribution in various outlets located in Eldoret, Kapsabet and Iten towns ahead of the planting season.

Impounded chemicals

Ipara has consequently warned consumers of agricultural chemicals against buying products from unregistered entities to save their crops and livestock. 

The dealers are taking advantage of the next planting season to sell the fakes at high prices. 

“Some traders remove expiry dates on labels of fertilisers, herbicides, fungicide and animal feeds,” Ipara said.

 The county police chief has warned cartels who are still thriving in counterfeit agricultural products and frustrating the government’s fight against the vice saying their days are numbered. 

“We will scale up the fight against counterfeit agricultural products by ensuring that only dealers registered with board are allowed to handle pesticides products,” said Ipara.

The country was estimated to have lost at least Sh120 billion anually in revenue to unregistered agro-chemicals dealers and counterfeit pesticides by 2018, according to Agrochemicals Association of Kenya (AAK) chairperson Patrick Amayunzu. 

Amayunzu said counterfeits account for 15 to 20 per cent of agrochemicals being distributed in the country. Some of the companies employ clever marketing practices such as selling from the back of  trucks, pickups  or from the their cars, he said.