Conclusion

Indeed, tea production in Kenya has been successful; leading major foreign exchange earner for the country. However, the sector has failed its own vulnerable and often exploited producers - the small-scale farmer, who are the backbone of the sector, producing more than 60% of the total export. In this case, we find out that small scale farmers are exploited by the middle men and even worse, by the institutions such as KTDA and TBK that were intended to manage tea sector in Kenya. Evidently, the government has failed to safeguard and protect small scale farmers from tea brokers and corrupted officials that continue to exploit them. 

Even though Kenya's economy has benefitted from tea over the last few decades, structural challenge still exists and continues to limit the country’s potential. In this regard, the failure by the government to shield it's vulnerable and poor farmers from the pangs of big corporations - both buyers and growers - continue arming those farmers that have played a key role in transforming Kenya’s tea sector. Of course, major cooperative societies that unite small scale farmers have been formed but they are short of influence big corporations have on the governments and the control of foreign markets and the advantage of investing on adding value to raw tea (Wachira, & Rono, 2005; p. 19-31).

Increasing global temperatures has the potential to change tea-growing areas dramatically and reduce yields, as previously ideal conditions no longer can produce at the same level. In this case, tea sector is not immune to climate changes and it is prudent that the major stakeholders come up with efficient and effective ways of countering these effects. The government has not prioritized grievances of smallholder farmers, often leaving them making loses due to bad weather conditions especially when is a drought. On the other hand, tea plantations have invested heavily on technology and they are able to detect and prepare in advance in cases of droughts, yet farmers cannot even afford to buy fertilizer for their food crops (Kagira et al., 2012).