WITH THE RIGHT LEADERSHIP, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY ARE KEYS TO NYANZA DEVELOPMENT PROBLEMS

According to the 2009 Kenya Population and housing census, Nyanza had a population of about 5.5 million people making about 14 percent of Kenya’s population. Nyanza is one of the regions of Kenya that borders Lake Victoria, one of the largest fresh water lakes in the world. Considering that the lake borders all counties in the region except Kisii and Nyamira, fisheries is therefore one of the key natural endowment of the region that could net the highest source of income for the region. Besides fishing, the region is endowed with diversified climatic conditions suitable for different types of agricultural activities ranging from dairy, sugarcane, tea, coffee, cotton, irrigated rice farming, tobacco, production. Nyanza also has high gold deposits and untapped tourism potential. With all these resources, it is disheartening to know that 50 years after independence, the region is still lumped among some of the poorest regions of the country. The question is how can Nyanza region use the new constitutional dispensation to activate its socio-economic potential? Which sectors should they prioritize and which tools can help them optimize the outputs to give them a competitive edge over other regions in the country?

In just about 5 weeks, Kenya will be ushering in a devolved system of governance that will allow counties to charter their own path and pace of socio-economic development. The country is poised to have a central government overseeing development of vital sectors such as, national security, health, education and infrastructure development and county governments for county development. In the spirit of inclusive decision making at all levels, Chapter 6 of the constitution emphasizes that all persons in authority uphold high integrity, accountability, transparency, honesty at all times and in all levels of decision making. The reasons for the slow development in the counties within Nyanza may be diverse and may range from unaccountable leadership to laxity on the government to provide conducive enabling environment that allows investors to set base in the region. That is in the past now. Looked at positively, this could be a blessing for this region because other regions were exploiting and exhausting their natural resources, the county governments in this regions will be starting with almost vast virgin potential. This will therefore make Nyanza counties attractive new frontiers for investors especially in the outlined sectors. It is however, imperative that all leaders especially those vying for political office within the counties and senate re-evaluate their approaches to leadership because it will not be business as usual. They will have to be smart and strategic, take stock of the resource potential and challenges and carefully develop effective actions plans that will bring forth the best in terms of socio-economic growth for the region. The onus of self-actualization as a people and a county/region has been bestowed to the counties by the constitution, the era when regions used to blame central governance for their lack of development are long gone.

Among the key sectors that Nyanza stand to benefit from are; fresh water fisheries and fish-allied industries, sugar production, cotton production and textile business, mining, irrigation-assisted horticulture, and tourism. The regions of Kisii highland have huge potential for horticulture, coffee, tea and dairy production. Each of these sectors has the potential to contribute directly to the development of the counties and indirectly to foreign exchange for this country. The fisheries sector for instance has the potential to create enough jobs for the local population in Siaya, Kisumu, Homa bay and Migori which borders the lake. If results from inland fish farming under the economic stimulus program are anything to go by, even Kisii and Nyamira counties can make a contribution through this sector. The sector however need to adopt new emerging technologies in fish farming, production and processing to add value and maximize on outputs in terms of sales from fish products and by-products such as animal feeds, leather for bags and shoes and other accessories. The same innovative approach should be used in sugar cane production. The counties in Nyanza have potential to produce more sugar than the country needs. Production systems must however be overhauled to take into consideration new sugarcane production technologies that have been researched and proven to be efficient to ensure that farmers get return from their investments through competitive pricing for both locals and international markets. Such technologies include irrigated sugar farming technologies as used in Gezira in Sudan. Besides, sugar companies must diversify so as to spread production costs and maximize on earnings by becoming innovative and explore alternative uses of sugarcane products such as using bagasse to generate their own electricity, biofuels production, paper production, and producing industrial spirits and wines from sugar juice. Taken together with good conditions for cotton production and the ready AGOA market, rich gold deposits in Migori county and the huge but idle irrigated horticulture potential in Nyando, Nyakach, Nyatike, Yala regions the county governors, senators and other leaders have their work cut out and it is upon those who will be elected to think through and come up with working strategies.

Addressing these socio-economic issues goes beyond just good leadership but will require the right tools and county policy frameworks that emphasize the use of Science, technology and Innovation(ST&I). The huge fisheries, sugarcane and cotton production calls for quality research towards unraveling the magnitude of these resources, the bottle necks limiting exploitations and effective interventions needed to unlock the benefits. Active participation of research institutions such as Kenya Marine and Fisheries Research Institute, Kenya Sugar Research Foundation and Kenya Agricultural Research institute and Kenya Cotton board is therefore paramount. More important, the county governments must recognize from the onset the importance of ST&I in moving their development agenda and appoint Science and Technology advisers who will help them come up with research programs and technological interventions for the problems within the counties. The researchers working in these key sectors must share and disseminate their research outputs with the relevant stakeholders to enable them make informed policy and practical decisions on how best to tap the resources. More importantly, if research dissemination is to achieve the required impact, it must move from the usual highly scholarly conferences to public barazas in which well packaged research information in easy to read and access to reach the real consumers of such research findings. The three public universities in the region namely, Maseno, Kisii and Bondo must rise to the occasion and refocus their training and research programs towards consolidating the gains in fresh water fisheries, cotton production, sugarcane production, mining, irrigation and horticulture productions and addressing the endemic infectious disease scourge of Malaria, HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis in the region. Already, Nyanza boasts of the highest concentration of medical research programs in the country and this can be used to create centers of excellence in R&D in infectious diseases not only for the county but also in the region. At we talk, many local and international research agencies such as the Centre for Disease Control of the Department of Health of the USA government are already on the ground doing all sorts of research in the region. Such research must always be scientifically sound and ethical and be focused in addressing local county and national problems. The Universities, the research institutions and the locals must therefore come together to decide which research programmes to prioritize and which can be in the back burner.

To conclude, the sky is the limit if all the challenges affecting the high potential sectors in Nyanza are addressed using ST&I. The new leadership must however project foresight, selflessness and come up with good development priorities through well thought out master plans. In all these endeavors, Chapter 6 of the constitution must be upheld with the needs and aspiration of the local people coming first. All the best Nyanza, this is surely your time to shine.