The Future of Smallholder Farming in Eastern Africa - Uganda ...

3.3 The Role of Infrastructure and Government Policy in Maize Marketing
Infrastructure is generally defined as material, institutional, and personal facilities and
arrangements that allow production and movement of goods and services (Thimm 1993). As
Jayne et al. (1997) note, food markets in Africa are characterized by small-scale trader
operations, limited trader investment in transport and storage, and the slow pace of private
market development. This section identifies the role of different infrastructure components in
influencing the efficiency of the maize marketing system in Kenya. Specifically, the role of
transport, storage, market centers, and other marketing facilities in promoting the
participation of private traders in the maize marketing system is considered.
3.3.1 Transport Infrastructure
As shown in Table 10, about 79 percent of the sampled traders used dry-weather roads, which
are normally impassable during the wet season, to move maize from the farms to the markets.
These dry-weather roads are mainly in the rural districts of Trans Nzoia, Mbeere, and Migori.
A wide variety of transport modes used by private maize traders were identified. These
include long-distance lorry haulers, bicycles (bodabodas), pickup trucks, donkeys, oxcarts,
handcarts, head loads, and tractors. The relative importance of the various modes of
transporting maize is indicated in Figure 4.
About 66 percent of the sampled traders reported that the road network is not well developed
for easy transportation of maize. Maize traders encounter a number of problems when
transporting their maize, including poorly maintained roads with potholes, high maize
transport costs, insecurity, and impassable, dry-weather-only roads. Table 11 shows a ranking
of these problems on basis of the number of traders that considered each of them as the most
important. I t was observed that the perception of the severity of each problem varied by type
of trader as depicted in Table 12. Opinions were varied about how the transport problems
could be solved. As shown in Figure 5, the majority of the traders wanted the road network
improved through tarmacking of the dry-weather roads and regular maintenance of the
existing roads.
Table 10--Types of roads used to transport maize to local markets
District
Number of traders who report using:
All-weather roads
Dry-weather roads
Mbeere 10 35
Nairobi 16 8
Trans Nzoia - 51
Migori 12 47
Total 38 (20.8%) 141 (79.2%)
Source: Authors’ survey, 2001.
Table 11--Transport problems reported by traders
Problem Number of traders %