Effect of fertilizer supply support programmes on farmers’ participation in maize production in Trans-Nzoia County, Kenya

Abstract

Agriculture is important for food security and poverty reduction. Achieving food security is still a challenge to some developed and most of the developing countries. Maize is the main staple that most people in Kenya still depend on. The production of maize has been in the decline over the years with an average annual production of 30 million bags (2.7 million metric tons) against an annual consumption of 42 million bags (3.78 million metric tons). The country on average suffers a maize deficit of about 10 million bags (900,000 metric tons) annually and occasionally imports maize. In Trans-Nzoia County which is the grain basket in the country and where maize is mainly grown as an income generating enterprise, the cost of production is high. This has been caused by the high cost of fertilizer which led to low achievements of acreages and yields under maize. The Kenya Government had put in place programmes to motivate maize farmers to improve maize production. These included the Fertilizer Subsidy Programme (FSP) and the National Accelerated Agricultural Input Access Programme (NAAIAP) which provided resource poor farmers with subsidized and free fertilizer respectively. Despite all these interventions, the maize deficit in the country is still very high. This made it necessary to find out on the effects of these interventions on maize production in Trans-Nzoia County and the challenges facing the implementation of these programmes. The main objective of this study was to investigate how these fertilizer supply support programmes benefited maize farmers in relation to increase in acreages, fertilizer use and yields in Trans-Nzoia County. The research design in this study was a cross sectional survey, where structured questionnaires were administered through interviews to collect data from 180 randomly selected farmers in all the three districts of Trans-Nzoia County. The data were analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). A reliability coefficient (Cronbach alpha) of 0.83 against a set Cronbach alpha of 0.70 and the null hypotheses were tested at 0.05 α confidence level of significance. The findings showed that in the two programmes, there was statistically significant difference between quantities of fertilizers acquired, acreages and yields achieved before and after fertilizer supply support programmes. The fertilizer use increased from 37 to 68 bags per farmer under the subsidy programme and from 2.2 to 4.3 bags under the NAAIAP programme. Under the FSP, the mean acreages increased from 14 to 18 per farmer and yields increased from 15 to 23 (90 kg) bags. This study recommends that the Government can continue with subsidy programmes because they lead to an increase in acreages, use of fertilizer and yields which may promote the agricultural growth.