History

The Cotton Lint and Seed Marketing Board
The first legal instrument to regulate the Cotton Industry in Kenya was the Cotton Lint and Seed Marketing Act of 1955 which formed the Cotton Lint and Seed Marketing Board whose main function was to purchase both lint and seed from the ginners and advise the Minister of Agriculture on the prices to be paid by ginners to growers.

Cotton Board of Kenya
The Cotton Lint and Seed Marketing Act of 1955 was repealed by the Cotton Act, Cap 335 in 1990 and established the Cotton Board of Kenya as a State Corporation under the Ministry of Agriculture.

Cotton Development Authority
The Cotton Act was amended in 2006 to create the Cotton Development Authority under section 3.

The Sisal Board of Kenya

The first legal instrument to govern the production of sisal was the Sisal Industry Act, 1946 (No. 77 of 1946) which established the Sisal Board of Kenya. This Act made provision for the promotion and control of the sisal industry. In 1951 the Sisal Industry (Sale of Sisal and Collection of Cess) Rules, were made under the Sisal Industry Act Cap 341 to regulate some aspects of the sale of sisal or sisal fibre. As per these rules, no sisal or sisal fibre produced within Kenya was to be sold except through an agent duly licensed under section 7 of the Act and the Board was, from time to time, would prescribe conditions to a licence and determine the prices that should be paid for sisal and sisal fibre.

Agriculture and Food Authority - Fibre Crops Directorate

The Ministry for Agriculture initiated structural reforms in 2010 which sought to reduce the multiplicity of regulatory and research functions; maximize the benefits of economies of scale by merging parastatals with similar or related functions; and strengthen the capacity of parastatals responsible regulation and research to effectively undertake their core mandates. These reforms culminated in the enactment of the Agriculture and Food Authority Act, No. 13 of 2013; The Crops Act, No. 16 of 2013 and the Kenya Agriculture and Livestock Research Act, 2013 (KALR Act, No. 17 of 2013). Following the operationalization of the Crops Act 2013, the Cotton Act, Cap 335 and the Sisal Industry Act, 1946 (No. 77 of 1946) the of parliament were repealed and subsequently, the Fibre Crops Directorate was established and assumed the functions of the Sisal Board of Kenya and Cotton Development Authority. To date, the regulatory, development and promotion mandate of the fibre value chains is under the AFA-Fibre Crops Directorate.

After the merger of former Boards responsible for various value chains to form the Agriculture and Food Authority (AFA), the envisaged efficiency gains were not realized due to challenges that included, a lack of a Board of Directors, inefficiencies in operations, financing challenges following the revocation of crop levies in 2016. These reforms did not achieve the intended objectives leading to the general decline in the performance of all the major crop sub-sectors and raising concern among stakeholders many of whom have continued to agitate for the Ministry’s reintroduction of the former regulatory boards. In an attempt to address these challenges, the Ministry for Agriculture initiated further reforms which led to the enactment of the Tea Act in 2022. Subsequently, the Board of AFA was constituted in 2023, in order to strengthen the effectiveness of the Authority in its mandate to regulate, develop and promote the scheduled crops sub-sectors.