Kenya loses Ksh.20B in five years over delayed adoption of GMO crops - Report

Kenya has lost over Ksh.20 billion in just five years due to delays in approving advanced crop varieties that could boost food security and farmer incomes.

A new report warns that misinformation and regulatory bottlenecks are keeping life-changing technologies out of farmers’ hands and consequently costing the country billions.

The study titled ‘The Cost of Delay’ paints a sobering picture of what Kenya is losing by not adopting three advanced crop varieties; insect-resistant maize and cotton, and a late blight disease-resistant potato.

“The Ksh.20 billion is money that we could have used to feed our people. Just to put this in perspective, that money is able to buy over 300,000 metric tonnes of maize that can feed more than 1.5 million Kenyans. And that is the magnitude of the loss that we are facing as a result of the delay in adopting this technology," said Dr Daniel Kyalo, Senior Manager, Agribusiness, Policy and Commercialisation, AATF.

The report by the Breakthrough Institute, Alliance for Science, and the African Agricultural Technology Foundation, among others, shows that if Kenya moved swiftly to commercialise these crops, they could inject more than Ksh.60 billion into the economy over the next three decades.

For instance, the advanced Bt maize, developed by Kenyan scientists, resists pests like the stem borer and fall armyworm, which wipe out up to 20 per cent of harvests every year.

The report says that had it been commercialised earlier, farmers could have produced an extra 194,000 tonnes of maize — enough to cover a quarter of Kenya’s maize imports in 2022.

That delay in adopting Bt maize cost farmers and consumers about Ksh.8.7 billion, money spent on costly pesticides and imported food that could have been saved.

For cotton farmers, the story is similar. The rollout of Bt cotton, now finally approved, was delayed by almost five years — costing Kenya’s textile sector hundreds of millions. And for potato farmers battling the late blight disease, the delay in approving a resistant Shangi variety is costing over Ksh.7 billion in lost benefits.

“There are a lot of myths around genetically modified food crops. And it is these myths and misinformation in our population that have led to all these conversations as to whether or not GM maize is safe, Bt cotton is safe, and many other GM food crops," Dr Kyalo noted.

Josephat Muchiri, Acting Director, Biosafety Research and Compliance, National Biosafety Authority, added; “We have had a lot of court cases. Some of them may have been dismissed; others are still active. And because of those litigations, the deployment of GMO technologies has been slowed down. We hope those cases will be determined in a short period of time, after which the authority is able to progress with its mandate to assess and make decisions on GMOs.”

The report also finds that adopting these advanced crops could reduce Kenya’s greenhouse gas emissions by up to 0.7 per cent, thanks to reduced deforestation and pesticide use.

With eight African countries already growing genetically modified crops — including Ethiopia, Ghana, and Nigeria — scientists say Kenya risks being left behind if stagnation in policy continues.