After retiring, Kuseyo ole Sasai wasn’t sure
what to do after serving the government for
many years.
He explored various businesses before choosing
to set up a greenhouse to grow tomatoes on a
leased parcel of land in Narok County with
Sh120,000 capital.
“The place was dry and rains were inadequate.
Transporting water to the greenhouse was
costly. I spent most of my income irrigating the
land,” said Mr Sasai.
As income from tomatoes dwindled, he started
planting garlic, vegetables and rearing dairy
cows, naming the farm Saumu ranch.
Saumu is a Kiswahili word for garlic.
The farm is divided into four parts. 20 acres
are under garlic and courgette, and he rears
dairy cows on another section. At the moment,
he is considering putting up a camping site on
one part which is adjacent to a river.
“The lower part of the ranch, which is largely
undeveloped and scenic with a cliff, borders
river Enkare Ng’osor. I plan to set up a
camping site there,” Mr Sasai told Money .
“I invested about Sh2 million in dairy farming,”
says the former director of the Kenya Dairy
Goats Association. He borrowed much of the
money from banks and invested in a water
project for irrigating his land and watering
animals.
Hard work and determination bore fruit and
Mr Sasai soon broke even. Eventually, dairy
farming outperformed all other activities. By
virtue of his background, he had an upperhand
in running the livestock business.
“I used to give farmers advice on how to keep
dairy animals and even ventured into it on
small-scale,” he said.
MODERN ZERO GRAZING
Four years since he launched his business, Mr
Sasai now runs his outfit, Kuseyo Dairies in 74-
acre ranch. It is a modern zero grazing unit
with 11 Friesian cows which he bought at
Sh100,000 each.
“I want to make a difference in the society.
Maasai’s are poor yet they have vast land and
thousands of cattle which bring them no value.
I want to be an example of what we can do
with our resources,” Mr Sasai said.
The farmer makes Sh300,000 per month from
milk sales while garlic and courgettes fetch
over Sh100,000.
Each litre of milk attracts Sh45.
“The first thing one needs to do before setting
up a dairy farm is to plant fodder and have
sufficient animal feed. This is the kind of
information I want to give my community
members,” he said.
“I discovered that I needed to transform my
community and bring about change by
demonstrating that there are options other than
the traditional way of farming which brings
low returns,” he said.
To run his enterprise, he has employed six
permanent workers and hires casuals when
need arises.
“I am disappointed that my community
members have poor work ethics.
That is why I
have to bring in workers from other parts of
the country. But my strategy is to put one local
in each section of Saumu ranch for a given
period. As they learn, I want to support them
to replicate this venture in their homes’’ he
said.
Nearby schools and shopping centres provide
steady market for his produce.
Sometimes, however, the market is flooded
with milk and other farm produce, said Mr
Sasai, seeing many producers lower prices.
However, he overcomes this obstacle by
capitalising on the regular customers such as
schools, he said.
The farmer shares a word of advice to those
considering to venture into farming — conduct
market research.
Successful agri-business, he said, must start
with a study of the target market: “Before I
started growing garlic and courgettes, I studied
the market and established that it needed the
products and that the returns were good,” he
said.
COW MATTRESSES
Mr Sasai says that dairy cows are like humans;
the more comfortable they are, the more milk
they produce, and the more profit one makes.
He urges farmers to invest in cow mattresses if
they want to increase milk output. To become
a successful dairy farmer, he says, one does not
need to be a livestock expert, all one needs is
passion, information and keenness to learn
from the successful pioneers.
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