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The construction of a Sh 400 million Animal feed factory that would directly employ 500 people and put Homa Bay County on the path to industrialization, has finally begun. Work is currently going on at Kabunde, in the outskirts of Homa Bay town as the contractor raced against time to beat the deadline. Governor Cyprian Awiti said the Animal feed factory was one of the flagship projects expected to add value to various agricultural, Fish and livestock projects across the county.

As work went on at Kabunde, another contractor was working on yet another project- a Sh 160m Maize milling plant at Kegoto in Suba Sub County. The County’s Executive member for Trade , Investment and Industrialization, Prof Tom Ogada said both the Animal feed and maize milling projects were being done on a Public –Private Partnership arrangements.

“This animal feed project aims to establish a factory to process omena and some other locally available resources such as maize rice bran, cassava, cotton and sunflower cakes,” said Prof Ogada.

He added: “It will produce animal feeds poultry, fish and diary meals that will be locally consumed by the dairy, fish and poultry projects that are being spearheaded by the county government.

“ Prof Ogada explained that raw materials will come from the maize mill, the cotton cakes, fish skeletons from the fish factory and omena. “It is estimated that the plant will require around Kshs 160 million to build and operate at initial stages . The County plans to invest around Kshs 100 million with the remaining eventually coming from the private sector.” He added that the eventual cost will run to over Sh 400m when finally completed. Mr Awiti said Animal feed project was coming up at a time Homa Bay was having only one industry- a sugar factory in Ndhiwa.

“We are ready for an industrial take off. This year, we have lined up a series of major projects, beside provision of clean water, energy and infrastructure,” said Mr Awiti.

“The Maize milling plant will produce 20 tons of maize per day and create more than 100 direct jobs,” he said.
He added: The main objective of this project is to promote value addition of maize through maize milling and consequently provide the farmers with reliable market for their produce.”

The county government has also put up a potato processing factory in Kabondo and was finalizing plans to set up a pineapple processing plant in Kochia, Rangwe sub county. Mr Awiti said he had held fruitful talks with President Uhuru Kenyatta and his Deputy William Ruto on the tarmacking of the Mbita-Sindo-Magunga- Sori road. The road falls under the National government.