EDITORIAL: Prioritise food safety as we combat Covid-19

Editorials

EDITORIAL: Prioritise food safety as we combat Covid-19

Monday, April 27, 2020 22:03

By EDITORIAL

Despite its disruptive effect on almost every aspect of our daily lives, the spread of Covid-19 has also spawned unexpected quality and hygiene consciousness among Kenya’s commodity handlers.

Just one week after local farmers called on regulators to step up quality audits of tea from Eastern Africa being exported to the rest of the world via the Mombasa port, the horticulture industry are sailing in the same waters. What started with a directive to register all fresh produce transporters before they could allowed on the roads has since escalated to all-out quality control campaign.

As the Horticulture Directorate has directed, all fresh produce growers and handlers must adhere to safety standards, ensuring they observe guidelines on aspects like chemical usage, transport and storage as well as maintaining hygiene across the commodity market value chain.

According to the Directorate, such enhanced quality control measures are meant to ensure zero chances of coronavirus transmission via food chains.

And given that we’ll always be as healthy as the quality of food that we allow on our tables, the place of such food safety measures cannot be gainsaid. Only that the bigger picture looms larger than our daily efforts for healthy living.

Being a key exporter of tea and horticultural produce, a reputational dividend will always lie ahead for Kenya whenever quality and safety standards become involuntary concerns across local industry value chains.

And just to be sure, the campaigns could not have come at a better time. The country cannot afford a reputational risk at this moment that its two top export crops are struggling in the market.

Earnings from tea exports dropped by 16.4 percent last year to Sh117 billion as production edged down and average prices of the commodity slid through 2019.

Similarly, export earnings from horticulture dropped by about seven percent to 142.7 billion over the same period.

We commend every effort being put in place, not only to safeguard traditional markets but also to open new ones so that farmers can earn fair prices for their commodities. But food safety must come above all other concerns.

If there is any chance that coronavirus can be spread though poor handling of agricultural commodities, let Kenyan producers win over the world with their fidelity to global hygiene standards.