KTDAL – Building Sustainability through Inclusion

Before the 19th century, agriculture in Africa was mainly subsistence farming with most of the fertile land being left unused. It was with the advent of the British colonial rulers that the agricultural scenario witnessed a major transformation. The colonial rulers occupied or acquired a majority of the fertile land from the native Africans and encouraged British and other European settlers to take to agriculture in Africa by passing laws and policies that favoured the settlers. The native Africans were made to work as labourers in the settlers’ farms. Though there was friction between the European settlers and the locals, Kenyan agriculture was broadly classified into two –large farmers who owned plantations covering thousands of hectares of land and small farmers with an average holding of less than 0.50 hectares of land..