The Kenya Union of Sugar Plantation is now blaming the government for the cane shortage being experienced in the country.
The Kenya Union of Sugar Plantation secretary-General FrancisWangara has condemned the government for failing to implement various sugar task forces reports which detailed how to revive the sugar industry.
Speaking to the press in Kisumu on Friday, Wangara said the industry will continue to fail if the government ignores the implementation of the reports.
“Reinventing the wheel is unnecessary, we should look at the reports, have them reviewed and implement where necessary,” he said.
Wangara says such reports, by former Governor Wycliffe Oparanya during the tenure of former agriculture cabinet secretary Mwangi Kiunjuri, are gathering dust in the shelves after consuming huge amounts of tax-payers money.
Wangara says the mushrooming of sugar factories has led to the shortage of cane in the country, noting that there must be measures put and adhered to on how to start a sugar factory.
The factories are everywhere with no sugarcane nucleus, some expand their milling capacities, so they start scrambling for the raw material leading to shortage of cane,” he said.
The same, he said, applies to setting up of weighbridges, which he blamed the factories for setting up such facilities even in areas not within their jurisdictions.
“The start should be, plant the raw material that is what will necessitate you to set up a weighbridge, you don’t start with a weighbridge,” he said.
He noted that many weighbridges are put in areas where the cane catchment of that area was specifically meant for the millers around that place.