Dairy farming in Kenya is growing fast. Buoyed by a sharp rise in local demand of dairy products coupled with an improving industry in terms of Government investment and private sector innovation. We all consume dairy especially the numerous tea drinkers. Improved infrastructure and better technology has also helped farmers diversify from the regular subsistence farming.

Big Market players like Brookside are also helping small-holder farmers with transport to and fro their farms and they also offer agronomic support to help uninformed farmers yield the best quality and quantity milk from their cows. Dairy Farming in Kenya Brookside have been really progressive in aiding smallholder farmers ‘hack’ the game at the same time helping several Kenyans fight rural poverty through dairy farming . Brookside helps farmers in the following ways;

-A guaranteed market for their milk
-A grassroots milk collection network
- Empowerment through education
-Community Development
-Credit
-Support for cooperatives
-Prompt payments

Scientists are also in the business of breeding high quality cows and selling them to investors/farmers. E.g. in Nyeri you can get a pregnant fresian cow for KES 500 000 which will be producing more than 40 litres per day (more or less depending on your farming practices) for a couple of years to come. Make sure to diligently research into methods and ways of improving milk yield if you are a new farmer. There are many government agricultural resources such as KARI which are willing to help new farmers.

Brookside will pay you KES 30 per litre of milk, therefore 1 cow will take roughly 420 days of milking to recoup a KES 500 000 investment, not considering the calf’s milk, do the math. Something that Kenyan Dairy Farmers also need to put into consideration is selling in West Africa. Most West African countries import milk from Europe. Enterprising Dairy entrepreneurs should look into this. While logistics may be an issue this is a huge opportunity once you break in.