Kenyan Minister of Trade, Industry and Investment noted Belarus’ successes in agriculture

Belarus’ Deputy Prime Minister Leonid Zayats and Agriculture and Food Minister Igor Brylo held a meeting at the Belarusian Agriculture and Food Ministry with representatives of the Republic of Kenya: Minister of Trade, Industry and Investment Moses Kuria and Minister of Agriculture and Livestock Development Mithika Linturi. The government delegation of this level from Kenya first visited our republic.

Opening the meeting, Leonid Zayats underlined the interest in co-operation. First of all, he focused on the achievements of Belarus: the country is self-sufficient, over 60 percent of its products are supplied to foreign markets, and agricultural exports alone amount to $8.2bn a year.

“We sell agricultural products to over 100 countries,” the Deputy PM stressed. “And we are ready to offer partnerships and organisation of production in Kenya. We boast modern technologies enabling us to process milk powder and obtain ice cream, cheese and other dairy products from it.”

Leonid Zayats also suggested setting up joint ventures for the production of baby food, as well as enterprises for processing poultry and cattle: from Belarusian or local raw materials. It is also possible to establish a logistics warehouse for Belarusian products and supplies of domestic agricultural machinery to Africa.

The Minister of Trade, Industry and Investment of Kenya, Moses Kuria, in turn, noted that our countries have a lot in common, but there are also many differences.

“Belarus has gone far ahead in the field of industrialisation and mechanisation of agriculture,” noted the representative of Kenya. “Although we have two harvests, in the end we lose a large amount of food after harvest. Moreover, we have many small farmers, not large farms. Until now, there is a lot of land in the republic that is not cultivated. We need help to start working on it.”