Brookside Dairy rescinds decision to shut Taita Taveta plant

Brookside Dairy  has reportedly rescinded its earlier decision to shut down its milk cooling plant in Taita Taveta after Governor Granton Samboja met the company’s top officials in Nairobi.

Last week on Thursday, the company announced that it would be closing down its Wumingu milk cooling plant effective March 1, 2020 in a notice that sparked jitters amongst hundreds of dairy farmers in the county.

Addressing a public baraza in Wumingu, Samboja (pictured) assured dairy farmers that Brookside executives had agreed to continue receiving milk from local farmers.

“I met the Brookside executive chairman and we agreed they will continue receiving milk from today going forward. We also agreed they will be having consultative meetings with stakeholders on how to address some challenges that have prompted our farmers to withdraw from the company for lack of substantive profit,” he said.

However Brookside spokesman Wilson Okong’o said reports that the Company had planned closure of its operations in the county were unfounded saying no such notice had been issued to farmers.

“The story can only be factual if the farmers were issued with notice of closure but I can tell you there is none… everything about the whole story is just political and leaders are using it to seek political mileage,” Okong’o said in an interview with K24 Digital.