High Cost of Animal Feeds Pushes Grain Imports by 72 percent

Data from the USDA Foreign Agriculture Office shows that the rise in the cost of livestock feed products such as soybeans, soybean meal, and corn has seen a 72 percent increase in the grains’ imports for the period between 2012 and 2021.

In 2021, Kenya imported USD 21.0 million of soybean meal, which represents a 97 percent increase from 2017. Meanwhile, Soybean imports peaked at USD 8.5 million in 2020, most of which came from Ukraine.

To curb the rising cost of the feeds, the government has made key animal feed ingredients (yellow maize, soybeans, soy meal, cottonseed cake, sunflower seed cake, white sorghum, and fish meal) exempt from import duties.

A gazette notice dated June 10 exempted thirty millers from duty on imported raw materials used in the manufacture of animal and chicken feed.

The gazette notice noted that all imports shall be used for the manufacture of animal and chicken feed only and shall have been imported on or before October 31, 2022.

Currently, raw materials for feed in Kenya including cereals, soybeans, and oilcake are imported from the East African Community and Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) member states such as Uganda, Zambia, Malawi, and Tanzania. This is because of the low tariffs, geographical proximity, and GE-free products.

However, as the broader Eastern Africa region suffers from the worst droughts in over 40 years and high fertilizer prices, Kenya will have to look for alternative sources of grain.

High maize, wheat, and soy prices have been experienced globally for the last two years, which also translates to high milling by-product prices.

On average, raw material prices have gone up by about 30 to 60 percent. Though there exists an opportunity to shift to the use of yellow maize to lower the cost of production since it is readily available in the market, most of the seeds available in the market are genetically modified.

So hard hit are the dairy, beef, pig, and poultry farming sub-sectors that some farmers have downscaled their production or even been forced to close due to unavailability or unaffordability of the feeds locally.