Kenyan khat growers worried as Europe tightens laws

Isaiah Mjuana has grown khat on his farm near the town of Maua in the misty hills of central Kenya since he was born, he says. The father of four, born in 1971, is part of a community that has for many decades farmed khat, a short, wiry tree whose young leaves and stems are chewed at social gatherings in the Horn of Africa and Yemen. But Mjuana and hundreds of thousands of others in Kenya’s khat growing regions who rely on cultivating and exporting the plant – a mild narcotic known locally as miraa – may soon need to find different crops to produce.

Britain in July announced it will classify khat as an illegal narcotic on par with cannabis, joining much of Europe and North America, which already bans the substance. It followed a decision by the Netherlands earlier in the year. With its large diaspora community of Somalis, Ethiopians and Yemenis, Britain imported nearly a third of Kenya’s 23-million-dollar khat crop. The blow to farmers is expected to be immense.

“I have no other means of getting revenue,” Mjuana said. “We educate our children from this miraa.” Khat is king in Maua. The steep, lush hillsides stretching from the northern slopes of Mount Kenya receive just the right amount of rain and are at an ideal altitude for miraa. The red sandy loam is deep and pliable, perfect for roots to take hold. Mjuana is just one of some 500,000 Kenyans involved in the khat industry. Another 150,000 people in the East African nation benefit indirectly, according to officials.

Each morning a ritual takes place in the main market in Maua. Women clean the khat leaves, men toss them packaged onto the back of trucks. The goods are then rushed to other markets or Nairobi to be flown abroad. As the trucks leave, the labourers are already on their way to stalls to purchase food and other goods. “Everything depends on miraa,” said Omar Ahmed, the chairman of the Miraa Farmer’s Administration in Maua. “School systems, security, employment. (Without it) the economy of the area will collapse.”

Khat can be more profitable than Kenya’s two largest exports, coffee and tea. It is a low maintenance crop and provides continual income since farmers pick the young leaves every 30 days, unlike seasonal fruits. Kenya, prior to the newest bans, exported about 90 per cent of its khat. Mjuana, who stopped construction on a new house because of the ban in Britain, says he’s already feeling the strain.

“When the market was open in England, you could see businessmen all over the area buying miraa,” he said. “But now they are not coming.” Joel Ruguongo, 35, drives trucks of khat to Nairobi and worries he won’t be able to meet his car payments. “I used to make around six to seven trips per week,” he said. “Now I’m making only four.” Even those not directly involved are affected. A gas station owner in Maua said his sales dropped from 10,000 liters a week to 6,000 since the ban.

Britain banned khat, despite a recommendation against the move by the country’ Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, because it feared its ports were becoming a regional hub for illegal onward trafficking. For chewers in Maua, the classification of khat as a drug is offensive. “We have been living on this miraa since we are born. Even our grandparents used to live on this,” says Ruguongo. “So we are wondering why people are saying this miraa is bad.”

In particular, he says it is a disturbance of age-old social rituals – much like tea time – where people gather together for hours to chat and chew khat. “It’s something you use in social places,” he says. “When you chew the miraa you feel very relaxed.” Still, some Kenyans support the ban abroad, saying khat should not be treated differently than drugs. Whatever the alleged social ills, though, for the farmers and labourers for whom khat is a livelihood, any transformation will prove long and difficult.