{"id":4970,"date":"2026-01-05T12:25:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-05T12:25:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/4970\/"},"modified":"2026-01-05T12:25:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-05T12:25:12","slug":"drought-cripples-livestock-sector","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/4970\/","title":{"rendered":"Drought cripples livestock sector"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Ahatha
\nMuhumed who turned to livestock trading to support her
\nfamily<\/p>\n

Livestock trader Ibrahim
\nYussuf\u00a0<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Wajir livestock farmers and
\ntraders are grappling with a livelihood crisis as a prolonged dry spell has
\ndevastated the sector, pushing households to the brink of survival.<\/p>\n

The calamity has been caused by the failure of three consecutive
\nrainfall seasons\u2014the October-December 2024 rains, followed by the failed
\nMarch-May and the October-December 2025 seasons.<\/a><\/p>\n

At Qorahey market in the heart of Wajir town<\/a>, once a vibrant hub of
\nlivestock trade, business has slowed to a crawl.<\/p>\n

In an interview at the
\nmarket,\u00a0veteran livestock trader
\nMuhumed Mumin said he has never witnessed any drought as devastating as the
\ncurrent one in his 30 years in the<\/a> business.<\/p>\n

Mumin, who has traded
\nlivestock at the market for years, says the business no longer can sustain his
\nfamily.<\/p>\n

His daily earnings have
\nfallen sharply over three months, from more than Sh1,000 on a good day to as
\nlittle as Sh300.<\/p>\n

He stands leaning on a
\nwalking stick, watching over emaciated goats tethered nearby\u2014animals that now
\nfetch a fraction of their former value.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis business no longer
\ncan keep our family afloat,\u201d Mumin said in frustration.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is a complete waste of
\ntime. Can someone with eight or nine children survive on Sh300 a day?\u00a0Life
\nhas become very hard.\u201d<\/p>\n

Goats that once sold for as
\nmuch as Sh7,000 are now going for as little as Sh2,500, the lowest prices since
\nthe last major drought in Wajir.<\/p>\n

Traders say weak animals,
\npoor market demand and rising competition have combined to erode profits.<\/p>\n

Osman Hussein, another
\nlong-time trader, spent nearly five decades in the livestock business and says
\nthe situation has deteriorated rapidly.<\/p>\n

\u201cLivestock are weak and
\nprices are down. People who depend on this market are really in danger,\u201d he
\nsaid.<\/p>\n

Osman said the economic
\nstrain has forced many women\u2014traditionally housewives in the conservative
\ncommunity\u2014to join the market in search of income.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe women who were
\nsupposed to be at home are now here competing with us for survival. That shows
\nhow bad the situation is,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Former housewife Ahatha Muhumed turned to livestock trading to
\nsupport her family<\/a>\u00a0but falling prices have wiped out her profit margins.<\/p>\n

\u201cA she-goat that used to
\nsell for about Sh7,000 now goes for between Sh3,500 and Sh4,000,\u201d she told the
\nStar.<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes we go home
\nwithout a single shilling.\u201d<\/p>\n

The traders\u2019 challenges
\nmirror a broader humanitarian crisis unfolding across the county and region.<\/p>\n

The National Drought
\nManagement Authority said Wajir is among several counties placed on alert
\nstatus due to worsening drought conditions.<\/p>\n

The authority estimates
\n174,200 people require urgent food assistance as hunger and malnutrition rise.<\/p>\n

Livestock, the backbone of
\nthe economy, are suffering from severe forage shortages, weakened physical
\ncondition and increased mortality rates.<\/p>\n

In December last
\nyear,\u00a0MPs from Asal regions urged the national government to declare the
\ndrought a national disaster, citing rising distress among pastoralist
\ncommunities.<\/p>\n

The MPs, led by Eldas MP
\nAdan Keynan, who chairs the Northern Kenya Parliamentary Group, said declaring
\na national disaster would unlock emergency funding, streamline humanitarian
\nsupport and enable international partners to scale up interventions.<\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ahatha Muhumed who turned to livestock trading to support her family Livestock trader Ibrahim Yussuf\u00a0 \u00a0 Wajir livestock…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4971,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[80,351,352,98,100,353,101,350,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-4970","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-kenya","8":"tag-kenya","9":"tag-kenya-news","10":"tag-star","11":"tag-star-news","12":"tag-star-news-kenya","13":"tag-star-newspaper-kenya","14":"tag-the-star","15":"tag-the-star-kenya","16":"tag-the-star-newspaper"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4970","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4970"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4970\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4971"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4970"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4970"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4970"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}