Samburu County set to get bumper harvest following good rains

Farmers from Samburu County are expecting a bumper harvest in September after most areas in Samburu Central sub County received satisfactory rainfall from April this year.

This is after farmers in the region incurred huge losses over the past two years as their investment in buying seeds and fertilizers was lost due to a prolonged drought that destroyed their maize crops.

The county’s last bumper harvest of 42,000 bags was in the year 2013, since then the yields have been dwindling due to poor rainfall.

Peter Barikiwa Lekere, a pastor and a resident of Ledero Village in Samburu Central sub County, is among the over 9000 farmers from the county expecting a good yield after the region received adequate rainfall that favoured their crops.

Lekere said most farmers are set to witness better yields from their maize, beans, vegetables and tomato crops this year.

According to the county government, 12,000 acres of land under maize crop is expected to produce yields that would fully address the food shortage in the county.

Area Governor Moses Lenolkulal said the county that has been relying on relief food for the past two years may yield surplus maize that would be consumed locally and even sold.

“We have worked hard and we are expecting to harvest close to 400,000 bags of maize from Samburu Central. For the first time we will have surplus maize to sell,” said governor Lenolkulal who was addressing journalists outside National Drought Management Authority (NDMA) offices in Maralal Town after a meeting.

Governor Lenolkulal said the county government’s efforts to fight hunger and poverty in the region through arable farming have often been frustrated by severe droughts in the past years.