The Kenya Tea Development Agency (KTDA) on Monday, April 17, admitted to erroneously deducting more than Ksh1 billion from 600,000 farmers affiliated with the agency in March 2023.
Speaking to the media, KTDA chairman David Ichoho stated that the agency had started the process of refunding the funds deducted.
He explained that the agency was supposed to deduct Ksh5 but ended up deducting Ksh500 from each farmer.
“In the month of March, I think there was a hitch in our system and instead of deducting Ksh5, they deducted the whole amount.
“We are apologising to the farmers and we have already begun the process of returning the funds,” Ichoho stated.
The amount was payment for subsidised fertilizers that had earlier been given to the farmers at the price of ksh3,000 allowing them to pay Ksh500 at a later date.
“We had earlier deducted Ksh3,000 from the farmers for every bag of fertiliser but there was a deficit of Ksh500 for every bag.
However, Icholo stated that the KTDA had not yet determined if the error was made by their technology or a by a staff.
Forensic auditors noted that they were combing through the agency's financial systems to figure out how the amount was deducted from its new accounting platform.
Earlier in a notice on April 13, KTDA told farmers that it would be deducting the remaining Ksh500.
Officials noted that they would deduct Ksh5 every month until the amount was cleared because by the time of payment, they had not determined the actual price of the subsidised fertilisers.
“KTDA recovered from the farmers an advanced Ksh3,000 per bag at the time of payment of bonus in July 2022, and owed farmers a balance of Ksh500.
“The farmers agreed that the recovery and reimbursement or recovery would be done later upon confirmation of actual costs of fertilizer and the actual number of bags taken by respective farmers,” the notice read in part.
