MARKETING CHANNELS FOR HORTICULTURE IN KENYA

Marketing channels are used to move goods and services to consumers and information and payment back to producers. In developing countries, these channels also serve some additional functions:

1. They encourage production above subsistence level, giving small producers access to the market economy.
2. They create a potential for activities to be built in as services into the final product, thus giving consumers more satisfaction and producers, processors, and traders higher returns.

Marketing channels differ from country to country, due to different stages of development. They show very distinct features, depending on the objectives of the producers or the expectations of the consumers. In Kenya, this has led to a very interesting marketing structure for horticulture, from which some general conclusions may be drawn:

1. High rates of population growth, combined with still higher rates of urbanisation have caused large increases in local demand, compared with previous years.
2. The present real income level shows a high elasticity of demand. Increases in income are utilised for equal increases, on a percentage basis, of expenditure for horticultural product
3. A relatively large number of European expatriates and a still larger number of citizens of Asian origin have su ported the production of specific types of fruits and vegetables which are not always consumed in African households.
4. Strong demands from external markets in Europe, the Middle East and parts of Africa have provided incentives to a group of large-scale producers to concentrate on export markets, using the air freight capacity presently available.

Given such a diversified demand structure, there is no doubt that the supply has to move along distinct marketing channels if it is to reach the respective target groups. A discussion of Kenyan horticulture can therefore not be concentrated on one system but must take into account the fact that several systems are operating simultaneously.

It is well known that Kenya has ecological conditions which favour a wide range of horticultural products. From a development point of view, it is not a question of whether or not the country can satisfy the existing demand. It is a question of priorities concerning which demand to satisfy first and at what quality level. The answer depends in turn on answers as to where, in horticultural development, the government is prepared to allocate additional resources, how farmers can be motivated to increase