Mwangi, who took over as KAM CEO on 15 September, comes from a rural Kenyan village. In the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, he says, agricultural co-operatives were the “mainstay of the economy,” with enough resources to be able to buy tractors and trucks to deliver products such as wool and milk.
The skills that were learned in them, he says, have been forgotten and risk being lost. “We have to get back to basics.”
Between independence in 1963 and 1982, the number of registered Kenyan agricultural co-operatives climbed from 655 to 2,652. The co-ops were involved in the production, processing and marketing of most of the country’s farm products, as well as housing development, savings and credit. Their economic role diminished as economic liberalisation was pursued in the 1980s. According to Kenya’s ministry of industrialisation website, legislation in 1997 which completely removed the
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