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Agricultural Sector Development Support Programme (ASDSP11)

Agricultural Sector Development Support Programme (ASDSP11)

Overview

The Agricultural Sector Development Support Programme II is a nationwide program supported by the County and National Government of Kenya, the Government of Sweden (GoS), and the European Union (EU). ASDSP II is part of the implementation strategy of the Agricultural Policy (AP) for the National and County governments.

Goal & purpose

Goal– to contribute to “Transformation of crop, livestock and fishery products into commercially oriented enterprises that ensure sustainable food and nutrition security”.

 Purpose – “To develop sustainable priority value chains for improved income, employment, food, and nutrition security”.

 What is transformation

Move value chain actors (VCAs) from one economic level to the next

Have all value chain actors above the poverty line

According to international standards, the poverty line stands at 2 dollars per day per person in a household With a current exchange rate of 123/= per dollar today, then each person in a household should earn 246/= per day to be above the poverty line. However, according to vision 2030, each member of the household should earn 1200 per day.

Value chains

The program is supporting three value chains namely:-

  1. Cow Milk
  2. Bananas
  3. French beans

ASDSP II addresses the problems that hinder the commercialization of agriculture through the following four outcomes:

Outcome 1: Increasing Productivity of priority value chains

Outcome 2: Strengthening entrepreneurial skills of priority value chain actors

Outcome 3: Improving access to markets by priority value chain actors

Outcome 4:Strengthening Structures and capacities for consultation, collaboration, cooperation, and coordination in the sector

Implementation process

The programme uses a value chain approach where the enterprise supported follows the order as outlined below:-

  1. Input suppliers
  2. Producers
  3. Traders
  4. Processors
  5. Transporters

In ASDSP II, these are called nodes, so five nodes of the three value chains. The beneficiaries in all five nodes are called Value Chain Actors (VCAs) who are organized in groups and cooperatives that are termed Value Chain Organizations (VCOs) in this programme.

Target

The Programme works with 147 VCOs and 23,633 VCAs in three PVCs namely Cow milk, banana and French beans

Approach

The implementation of the programme is based on the Strategic Integrated Value Chain Action Plans (SIVCAPs) for the three value chains which were developed by identifying the critical challenges that hinder the commercialization of these three value chains in pursuit of food and nutrition security, income generation, employment and wealth creation. The documents have specified the inputs required from Stakeholders, Service providers and development partners, and County and National government towards the successful implementation of the action plans.

 Strategies

ASDSP II operates through collaboration with public and private service providers as a key strategy in delivering services to the targeted value chain actors. Other strategies include marketing through contractual arrangements and linkage to financial service providers such as AMICA SACCO; KCB; UNAITAS; FAMILY; and EQUITY banks; YEDF (Youth Enterprise Development fund) and UWEZO fund among others.

One of our roles is to enable VCAs access the market and in an endeavour to do that, the programme supported two of them, one dairy processor and one producer to participate in AGRITECH Africa in KICC in June 2022.

Outcome 4:Strengthening Structures and capacities for consultation, collaboration, cooperation and coordination in the sector

 

The County Agriculture Sector Steering Committee (CASSCOM) is one of the major structures formed within the devolved system of government whose major role, among others, is to strengthen coordination, collaborations and linkages with public and private institutions in the management and delivery of agricultural programmes and services in the County.  The CASSCOM is a membership committee established under the Chairmanship of the CECM of the leading sector value chain and in Muranga, it is chaired by the CECM,ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries .

coop

A service provider with some SabaSaba Dairy Cooperative Society members during a demonstration.

frenchbeans

French beans production under minimum tillage practice

Innovation concept

The programme, nationally and at the County level, is supporting Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA) and Green Growth (GG) technologies. Basically, this is a capacity-building programme. However, there is a small window to support women and youth with unique technologies not being used in their areas termed as innovations in this programme. This programme and specifically in Murang’a County has identified some technologies and some equipment towards this end was presented to the beneficiary VCOs on the 23rd December 2022 by his H.E Governor Dr. Irungu Kang’ata.

Outcome 1: Increasing Productivity of priority value chains

Productivity measures the quantity of output produced with a given quantity of inputs. Productivity growth reflects improvements in production efficiency.

Outcome 2: Strengthening entrepreneurial skills of priority value chain actors

A business mindset is being instilled in the VCAs and they are beginning to change their attitude towards their agricultural enterprises through training on entrepreneurial skills.

VCAs

A service provider training VCAs at Kigoro VCO on business plans

One of such VCAs who has a  business mindset is now employing 60-100 workers three times in a week&4 permanent workers who are on monthly pay on his French bean 6Acre hired piece of land.

French beans

Outcome 3: Improving access to markets by priority value chain actors
The results on training on marketing strategies and market surveys have born fruits and many VCAs are now selling their bananas in Kilograms (Kgs) and they have also been able to do their own market surveys with some selling their produce in Nairobi, Machakos, Makueni, Narok and Mombasa.

nginda

Bananas being weighed in readiness for marketing by a VCA in Nginda Ward,
Murang’a south sub county