By Mary Muema

For many years, marketing for farmers simply means disposing their produce, regardless of whether one makes profit or not. 

Most farmers take whatever price they are given by brokers or traders, especially when they have no alternative or they are in desperate need of cash.

This quick disposal is mainly because farmers lack post-harvest storage facilities to store their produce as they wait for better prices.

A majority of them also do not have value addition skills to enable them prolong the shelf-life of the produce.

In agricultural marketing, transportation costs, inadequate market infrastructure, lack of information, processing units and storage facilities and price fluctuation are a major problem for farmers. 

Further, high taxation rate in both licensing and purchasing of agricultural inputs and market levies such as the infamous cess tax add pain to farmers.

Cess is a tax on the movement of agricultural produce collected by the county governments in Kenya. The tax applies to all crop produce, livestock and products marketed in all outlets within the jurisdiction of county governments and on transit by road within the county.

However, despite the taxes, hygiene and waste disposal in food markets remain poor.  

Stalls, footpaths and roads within most markets are usually littered with dirt, often decaying farm produce. Various agencies responsible for reversing this decadence are either dormant or are fronting corrupt officers whose interest is mainly to extort money from the marketers. Coupled with the dirt, this makes selling of produce a tough task.

While there are efforts by the county governments to construct better stalls to enhance food safety standards, these measures have been too little as farmers continue to bear the brunt.

To try and reap from farming, many farmers have come together to form groups and have greater bargaining power.

However, most leaders of the groups lack the wherewithal to expand the quality of commodity and market it.

But there is hope, Kenya is leading in Africa in the adoption and use of technology-quintessentially for agribusiness transactions. This has seen the enhancement of information symmetry between farmers and potential markets on price, crop and produce quality on demand, geographical location of consumers and when commodities are needed. 

Online platforms such as Mkulima Young have revolutionised the era of brokerage and given the farmer the ability to project profits based on data available on consumer demand. 

Mkulima Young goes ahead to create a willing buyer-willing seller scenario bringing the marketplace in the palm of farmers. 

In using online marketplaces, farmers need to understand the market structure, which refers to characteristics that influence nature of competition and the process of price formation.  These characteristics include: 

• The number, size and diversity of buyers and sellers 

• Adequate size of sellers to encourage increased investment. 

• Freedom of entry and exit the structure of a market 

Unlike the open air market, online markets guarantee all the above three factors. Farmers, therefore, need to make use of the digital markets to grow their profits and thus their agribusinesses.

Mary Mwema is a young agripreneur and award winning writer; 
zealous about SDG 2 and the need for women leadership in agribusiness.
With a background in Agricultural Resource Management, 
she uses literature to advocate for climate-smart agribusinesses
and resource use efficiency.