The national government has ramped up its campaign against livestock diseases, with Principal Secretary Jonathan Mueke spelling out fresh commitments at the Mt Kenya Branch Agricultural Society Show held in Nanyuki. Speaking at the high-profile annual event, Mueke underscored that Nairobi is forging stronger alliances with county administrations and sector stakeholders to reverse the damage diseases are causing to farmers and export markets alike.
Livestock keepers across the country are grappling with a trio of stubborn problems: disease outbreaks, the steady degradation of rangelands, and shrinking access to markets. Foot and mouth disease has proven especially damaging, forcing restrictions on animal movement and effectively locking farmers out of key trading opportunities. The scale of the crisis was plain to see at the Nanyuki show itself, where exhibitors turned up with far fewer animals than in previous years, citing disease fears as the reason for holding back their stock.
To turn the tide, authorities are rolling out countrywide vaccination drives alongside artificial insemination programmes designed to lift the genetic quality of herds across Kenya. These measures are targeted squarely at the range of production challenges that have emerged in recent seasons and are intended to give farmers a firmer footing going into the future.
Cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe put the economic stakes in sharp relief, noting that livestock accounts for 42 percent of Kenya’s agricultural GDP and a notable 12 percent of national GDP. With the country’s population projected to double by 2050, the appetite for meat, milk, and other livestock products will grow in tandem — making a healthy, disease-free sector not just a farmers’ concern but a matter of national interest.
Laikipia County, which ordinarily channels significant volumes of beef and mutton to both local and export destinations, has taken a particularly hard knock. Disease outbreaks have disrupted supply chains at the source, and the situation has been made worse by instability in the Middle East — a crucial export market — which has curtailed demand and translated into heavy financial losses for producers across the region.
With the government’s intervention now picking up pace, farmers and industry players will be watching closely to see whether the vaccination campaigns and breeding upgrades deliver the relief the sector so urgently needs. For a country whose food security and foreign exchange earnings are tightly bound to the health of its herds, getting this right is not optional — it is essential.
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