Why the Chinese have got you eating their tilapia

The Wikipedia entry for "The World Is Flat", notes that the best-selling book by Thomas Friedman is a metaphor for viewing the world as a level playing field in terms of commerce, where all competitors have an equal opportunity.

Last week a Facebook group page for Kenyan digital farmers had a robust discussion that was sparked by a query, and a shocking discovery for many, that the Tilapia fish sold by a leading distributor for supermarkets in Nairobi is sourced from China.

Yes, highly perishable fish, from thousands of kilometres away is being sold here. But it’s not just tilapia.

If you look around more supermarkets, you will find honey from Tanzania and New Zealand, chestnuts from France, and more trout and mushrooms from China.

Comments beneath the fish discussion were overwhelmingly of shock. How did Kenyan authorities allow such products into the country?

What of the reported pollution levels in China and mustn’t they manifest themselves in the fish? How can a delicate meat product be edible after weeks of shipping?

My comment was that China has varying standards of quality for different global customers. What comes to a tiny market like Kenya is not going to be a top quality export product.

But there were also disclosures by some members of the group, that yes, they buy and resell the fish, and that China is the world’s largest exporter of tilapia.

The main reason they do this, they said, is that the fish from across the ocean is almost half the cost of Kenyan tilapia.

The farm is flat, and fish, which used to be an export from the coast and lake regions of the country, has become more competitive and available.

Long before the imports from China started, fish farming had taken root in many parts of the country; in inland places far from lakes, but also next to urban centres that had ready markets for it.

Fish farming was celebrated, and even financed, by local banks which found it easier to lend to urban tilapia farmers with fishponds than to traditional fishermen with boats and nets.

The farm is flat, and there are opportunities for almost anyone anywhere to produce food and supply it anywhere else.

The map of Kenyan agriculture that we grew up knowing in primary school has been thrown out. It is no longer completely true that cotton and sugar are grown in western Kenya, maize in the upper Rift Valley, wheat in the southern Rift, coffee in central Kenya and tea in the mid-west.

SUGAR, MAIZE AND VEGETABLES

The idea that nothing north of Nanyuki can be cultivated intensively is all outdated. If you ask farmers from Australia, they will tell you that arid northern Kenya, with its sparse rains, is just perfect for them and if you lease them a few thousand acres you will be amazed at the results from the land.

Other stories I’ve heard about the flat world of farm opportunity include Kenyan flowers being sold to Poland, Brazilian fish to Kisumu, Nile perch to Dubai, and dried Lake Turkana fish to the DRC.

At the same time, there’s sugar and maize from Uganda in Nairobi supermarkets, and vegetables from Tanzania sold at the city market.

While the government works with counties in western Kenya to bail out indebted, old sugar companies, they will have to compete with new private investors who are building sugar factories as fast as the regulator will allow them.

Sadly, there can also be a reverse of farms driven by other opportunities, and this is now being seen in the coffee and tea sectors.

In the same newspapers that celebrate Kenya’s coffee and tea export quality are also articles about farmers threatening to uproot both crops, and notices by farm owners who have decided to convert their large tea and coffee estates into malls and mansions.

Twitter: @bankelele