Looming sugar shortage. What we know so far

According to the latest statistics by Agriculture and Food Authority (AFA) production of bagged sugar in the country dropped from over 49,000 metric tonnes in March to nearly 32,000 metric tonnes. A 36 percent drop in the space of a month.

Closing stocks of sugar held by all factories also fell significantly by over 2,000 metric tonnes in the same period.

This was further worsened by the fact that sugar imports declined 85 percent between March and April this year.

The Kenya Economic Survey published in 2021 showed that Kenya’s sugar production capacity is staggering at an average of 603,800 tonnes annually against an average annual consumption of 1.04 million tonnes.

According to the Kenya National Alliance of cane farmers, millers have been pushed to rely on imported sugar and thus push the extra costs to consumers. 

“Under the Kenya sugar board there used to be a sugar development fund that used to use a lot of its money in sugar cane development. Since the disbandment of the board there has not been any funds for development of sugar. There is an acute shortage of sugarcane in the market to the extent that now there is a lot of immature cane that is being harvested resulting in this sugar that is dark… more molasses than sugar actually,” says Saulo Busolo, chairperson of Kenya National Alliance of Sugarcane Organisation (KNAFSO). 

The plea has been backed by Navakholo legislator Emmanuel Wangwe, who tabled the Sugar Bill 2022 which proposes to reintroduce the sugar development levy on domestic and imported sugar, which will be used for the development and promotion of the local sugar industry. 

The levy which was scrapped in 2016, was charged at 4% of the sugar factory prices, with the money used for research and infrastructural development for state owned sugar mills. 

“We need to focus on sugarcane production instead of what we are trying to see today that the whole focus is on sugar imports yet our own president was talking about bottom up so this is another serious area of concern that the current government must seriously focus on cane production to sustain the local industry,” says Charles Atyang’, a sugarcane farmer.