Githunguri Dairy denies ‘Fresha’ sale to Brookside

Githunguri Dairy Farmers Cooperative Society limited has denied reports in a section of the media that its Fresha brand is to be bought by rival Brookside Dairy.

The milk processor, based in Kiambu County says its owners – a strong unit made up of about 20,000 small scale farmers from the area are not about to be bought by Brookside Dairy which is largely owned of the Kenyatta Family or any other entity.

Unconfirmed reports indicated that Brookside made an undisclosed offer to buy out the milk society that is Kenya’s third largest player with 10 per cent of the market share behind Brookside (40%) and state owned New KCC (35% ).

In a statement, chairman Charles Mukora denied the reports and reiterated their focus to grow their range of products.

The former managing director for the Kenya Dairy Board — the industry regulator — also confirmed that any takeover intentions would be flatly rejected by the firm’s owners.

If Githunguri were to sell to Brookside, the market leader’s market dominance would grow to over 50% following year-on-year acquisition spree of rivals and smaller players in the past decade including Delamere in 2017, Freshy Dairy and Daima in 2015, Molo milk in 2013 and Tuzo, Lea and Ever Fresh in 2010.

Fresha is the flagship product of Githunguri Dairy FCS which was registered in August 1961 with an initial membership of 31 small-scale dairy farmers to collect and market member’s milk.

The society started with a single collection centre located at Githunguri town but have increased to over 76 collection centres and over six cooling centres.

The allegations come following a current standoff between farmers and processors on pricing for raw milk amidst the ongoing dry spell across milk producing regions of the country.