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GRADUATE SCHOOL OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

The influence of Nairobi’s waste management

governance on the actors in the fresh food supply chains

by

Anne Luz Pijnenburg

Letting Post-Harvest Losses Defer

into the Failed Waste Management

of Nairobi - The influence of

Nairobi’s waste management

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Colophon

Thesis Title Letting Post-Harvest Losses Defer into the Failed Waste Management of Nairobi - The influence of Nairobi’s waste management governance on the actors in the fresh food supply chains Author A.L. Pijnenburg Student number 10251197 Email anneluz.pijnenburg@student.email.com Date and Place 15 August 8, 2016 in Nairobi and Amsterdam Thesis supervisors and second reader Dr. ir. Y.P.B van Leynseele, N. Hoogervorst and dhr. Dr. E.K.. Chu Study Program MSc Human Geography, Environmental Faculty Graduate school of Social Sciences University University of Amsterdam Image front page: Author, 2016

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Abstract

The research that is conducted for this master thesis attends the problem of post-harvest crop losses in the supply chains of fruits and vegetables to the city of Nairobi in Kenya. In current food systems things must change to make the chains sustainable and efficient to reduce losses. In this research first causes of losses and the strategies of the actors in the supply chain to reduce these losses are analysed. However, during fieldwork it became clear that there was a surprising outcome. The strategies were mostly self-imposed and self-governed. There was no support from the government in waste management and finding sustainable solutions for the losses. There is a huge problem of deferral; the losses become worse after every process in the chain and it all (biodegradable and solid waste) ends up in one big landfill in the city. An overview of political decisions of the central government and decentralization policies of Kenya is made to explain why the waste management of Nairobi failed.

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Acknowledgements

First I would like to thank every person who made my experience in Kenya so wonderful. Everyone that generously gave up his or her time to help me show the city, country and culture and helped me understand the context in which I was researching. I am thankful for the valuable insights I gained on the topics of food chains and waste and hope I can continue working on these topics in my coming working career. Secondly, special thanks go to my supervisor Yves van Leynseele who motivated me to pursue my topics of interest, and encouraged me to push me beyond my limits. Also my lecturers Eric Chu and Joyeeta Gupta deserve gratitude for helping me rediscover my passion for sustainable development and making the specialization Environmental Geography so memorable. I feel enriched and inspired by all of you.

Also, I want to thank my friends and family for their endless support and my boyfriend for always believing in me. And last but not least, I want to thank the girls from the Environmental Geography track for the fun and new friendships I gained in this amazing year.

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List of Abbreviations

CBD Central Business District CCN City Council of Nairobi EU European Union FAO Food and Agriculture Organization FORD Forum for the Restoration of Democracy GDP Gross Domestic Product GoK Government of Kenya KASA Kenya African Socialist Alliance KANU Kenya African National Union KPU Kenya People’s Union KSH Kenyan Shilling NGO Non-Governmental Organization NDP New Democratic Movement NMR Nairobi Metropolitan Region UN United Nations UNEP United Nations Environment Programme USAID United States Agency for International Development WB World Bank

List of Figures

Figure 1. Difference losses developed vs. developing countries Figure 2. Hierarchy of managing food waste (once it is lost) from preferred to least preferred options Figure 3. Conceptual model

List of Charts

Chart 1. Location produce Chart 2. Source actor Chart 3. Losses due to transportation Chart 4. Disposal strategy after transportation Chart 5. Product in which the vendor has most losses

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Chart 6. Quantity loss Chart 7. Disposal strategy at selling level Chart 8. Opinion vendors on waste and losses Chart 9. Responsible actor for the cleaning of the dumpsites

List of Images

Image 1. Kiambu County Image 2. Overgrown crops Image 3. Selling from lorries in sacks outside market Image 4. Selling from lorries inside market Image 5. Dumped produce outside market Image 6. Dumped produce inside market Image 7. Before and after closing hours: pt1. Image 8. Before and after closing hours: pt2. Image 9. Dumping site at the City Park Market Image 10. Dumping site at the City Market Image 11. Dandora Dumpsite

List of Boxes

Box 1. Looking forward with Joseph, the young entrepreneurial farmer Box 2. Observation: After closing hours at Wakulima Market Box 3. The morality of giving losses a second life Box 4. Twiga Foods: the shortest chain there is

List of Tables

Table 1. Causes of losses on different levels in the supply chain Table 2. Association transportation method and source actor Table 3. Association transportation method and loss due to transport Table 4. Association loss due to transport and source actor Table 5. Percentages of types of waste

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Table of Contents

ABSTRACT 5

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 6

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS 7

LIST OF FIGURES 7

LIST OF CHARTS 7

LIST OF IMAGES 8

LIST OF BOXES 8

LIST OF TABLES 8

1. INTRODUCTION 11

1.1 PROBLEM STATEMENT 11

1.2 AIM AND OUTLINE OF THESIS 13

2. SETTING THE SCENE 14

2.1 NAIROBI: CAPITAL CITY AND COUNTY 14

2.1.1 MOVEMENT TO DEVOLUTION; MORE POWER FOR THE COUNTIES 15

2.2 KIAMBU COUNTY 17

3. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK 19

3.1 INTRODUCTION 19

3.2 DECENTRALIZATION IN WASTE MANAGEMENT 19

3.2.1 CHALLENGES IN GOVERNANCE 20

3.3 SUSTAINABILITY OF THE FOOD SYSTEM 21

3.4 POST-HARVEST LOSSES IN FRESH FOOD SUPPLY CHAINS IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES 23

3.4.1 CAUSES AT DIFFERENT LEVELS 24

3.4.2 STRATEGIES OF ACTORS IN THE SUPPLY CHAIN 26

3.5 CONCEPTUAL MODEL 28

3.6 CONCLUSION 29

4. METHODOLOGY 30

4.1 INTRODUCTION 30

4.2 RESEARCH DESIGN 30

4.3 OPERATIONALIZATION 31

4.4 UNITS OF ANALYSIS 32

4.5 DATA COLLECTION 33

4.6 DATA ANALYSIS 35

4.7 VALIDITY AND RELIABILITY 36

4.8 LIMITATIONS AND ETHICAL ASPECTS 37

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5. LOSSES AT PRODUCTION LEVEL 38

5.1 INTRODUCTION 38

5.2 CHALLENGES FOR FARMERS AND ITS EFFECT ON LOSSES 38

5.3 STRATEGIES TO DEAL WITH LOSSES 42

5.4 CONCLUSION 44

6. LOSSES ON MARKETING AND SELLING LEVEL 46

6.1 INTRODUCTION: A TALE OF MARKETS 46

6.2 IN THE MIDDLE OF THE SUPPLY CHAIN 47

6.2.1 FRESH AN JUICI LTD. 47

6.2.2 WAKULIMA MARKET 50

6.3 SPEAKING WITH THE VENDORS 55

6.4 CONCLUSION 65

7. GOVERNING NAIROBI’S WASTE 67

7.1 INTRODUCTION 68

7.2 FOLLOW THE WASTE 68

7.3 ZOOMING OUT: WASTE MANAGEMENT IN NAIROBI 69

7.3.1 GAP IN WASTE MANAGEMENT GOVERNANCE 70

7.4 CONCLUSION 71

8. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 74

BIBLIOGRAPHY 78

APPENDICES 84

APPENDIX 1. OPERATIONALIZATION TABLES 84

APPENDIX 2. TABLE OF RESPONDENTS AND DESCRIPTIONS 86

APPENDIX 3. TABLE OF VARIABLES USED IN SPSS 87

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1. Introduction

1.1 Problem statement

At the horn of the world´s most rural continent, Kenya finds itself as a forerunner in the trends of rapid urbanization. In the context of contemporary global urbanization, even Africa is expected to have an urban majority by 2030, as urban population continues to grow at about 3.5% per year (Haggblade et. all, 2012). Although Kenya can be seen as a developing country, it is encompassed and between booming economic growth and minimalizing the country´s developmental weaknesses. As rapid urbanization is accompanied by growing per capita incomes and a rising middle class, it also triggers and enforces fast growth in urban food markets. The political and economic capital Nairobi faces great challenges to keep up with rising consumption patterns. Subsequently, urbanization increases the pressure on the issue of food security in the city.

Rural and urban meet in the lively Fresh Food Markets of Nairobi. These markets, at the core of wealth creation and food security, serve as clear example for the contemporary challenges produced by rapid urbanization. The fresh food supply chain finishes here, where the consumption starts. However, an incredible amount of crops never make it to the customer and goes to waste instead. When looking at perishable crops, purely because of their nature, it is not surprising that their losses are higher than for instance cereals. But because the fresh fruits and vegetables are often the most important food supplies for people in developing countries and there is rising awareness on the high losses in the chain makes it an interesting and important issue to focus on in this research. It has been found that harvest and post-harvest losses (PHL) is becoming a real threat to food security (Gustavsson et al., 2011) and analyzing the post-harvest processes in the supply chains has been an upcoming but not well-researched subject in the last couple of years. Despite the current global focus on sustainability, yet little attention is paid to sustainability of the food system in Nairobi. Here, the city´s waste management is of utmost importance to create a circular food system. This thesis therefore aims to contribute to an explanation on dealing with PHL through waste management in Nairobi. Until recently studies have shown mostly estimates of post-harvest crop losses because it is difficult to point out where exactly in the chain the losses occur and often solutions for reducing loss fail to address all the dynamics

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of the chain. (Affognan, 2015) This motivated this study to look at different levels in the supply chain as to figure out what the knowledge was of every actor on this level about causes of and strategies to deal with losses. (Affognon et al., 2012) By looking through the lens of waste management, I explore how the actors of the fresh food supply chain deal with their PHL by looking at the causes and the strategies.

At the same time that economies are growing in developing countries and cities are urbanizing there has been a steady rise of a discourse of governance. Ideologically these developing cities tend to follow the practices of democratization, privatization, decentralization and liberalization. Nairobi’s political history includes several eruptions, including the post-election violence in 2008. It shows the big gap in the city between the rhetoric of governance and the political and economic realities most residents in Nairobi face in their daily lives. Even though Nairobi has huge thinks tanks on urban policy like UN-Habitat and the new Nairobi 2030 plan, these are major large-scale experiments with governance regimes that come and go. Even though their claim is that they will change the stressing situation, in the meanwhile the famous slums as Mathare and Kibera in Nairobi just keep growing larger and more deprived (Kinuthia, 1992; Murunga, 1999; Otiso, 2002 and Myers, 2011) ‘With the guiding hands of the World Bank, the UN, and major Western donors, and counter to their stated intentions, successive plans for new governance initiatives in Nairobi actually ‘limit the roles of stakeholders’, and narrow down who these stakeholders are. It actually further centralizes control in the national government; nowhere is this more obvious than in the newly created national Ministry of Nairobi Metropolitan District. (Mitullah 2008, p.62) Once again, ‘vertical accountability for citizen voice [is] limited’. (Hendriks 2010, p.71) As Winnie Mitullah (2008, p.66) puts it: ‘effective decentralization requires people to articulate their aspirations and priorities in policymaking and implementation, an act which has largely been the preserve of the economic and political elites. Due to suspicion and indifference, many people are not willing to participate.’ (Garth_A._Myers African_Cities_Alternative_Vision, 2011).

Decentralization is to give people more power but if people are not willing to participate it will fail. This discussion on governance in African cities has been very substantial when looking at the delivery of public urban services (electricity, water, sanitation, land and waste management). After independence in most African cities urban service delivery was seen as the responsibility of the government. However since independence African cities

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have put a lot of effort to privatize this delivery of basic urban services, but unfortunately these efforts increased inequalities of service delivery even more. (Kinuthia 1992; Murunga 1999; Otiso 2002 and Myers, 2011) To explore the reasons of these losses and waste we should look at where it comes from. Are there changes possible to reduce the losses in the chain so that the problem at the end in the city also can be reduced? And what do the actors already do? Based on the above the following question arose that will be at the centre of this research:

How are post-harvest losses managed by the actors, producers, wholesalers and sellers, involved in Nairobi’s fresh fruit supply chains in the context of the city’s waste management governance?

1.2 Aim and outline of thesis

To answer this question this study will aim to try and show the picture of waste and loss management in Nairobi through looking at causes of losses and the strategies of the actors to deal with these wastes and losses. The strategies to deal with losses are a reaction of how waste management is done or not done. It is an interesting, accessible and especially original way of looking at the issue of losses and waste in the food system of Nairobi. The aim is thus to contribute to literature by giving an explanation on dealing with PHL through waste management in Nairobi.

This thesis is divided into nine chapters. The first chapter is the introductory chapter with the problem statement and the relevance of the study. Next is a background chapter setting the scene of the research location. The third chapter is about the theoretical debates, the frameworks and the conceptual model. The methodological chapter operationalizes the main concepts; through an operationalization table and the conceptual model and introduce the sub questions that lead the empirical chapters. This chapter also explains the research design, data collection, analysing methods and what the limitations and ethical issues were for this research. The fifth, sixth and seventh chapter are the empirical chapters that will answer the sub questions of the research. Finally, the last chapters will provide the conclusion and further recommendations.

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2. Setting the scene

2.1 Nairobi: Capital city and County

For this study research was done on different levels. This section briefly explains the urban and political setting of the marketing and selling level in the supply chain of fruits and vegetables. Nairobi was established in 1895 as the capital of Kenya. It has a population of 4 million inhabitants and is leading the economy of Kenya as it is generating 60% of Kenya’s Gross Domestic Product. (Kazungu, 2010)

Political history after independence

Post independent Nairobi is known for a deeply divided urban situation. This is the consequence of the rapid growth rate, a lack of effective planning and the political economics of the city. (Myers, 2014) 4 elected presidents have run the country since independence; Jomo Kenyatta (1962-1978), Daniel Arap Moi (1978-2002) and Mwai Kibaki (2002-2009) and Uhuru Kenyatta since then. The political institutions remained mainly the same as the British and continued during post- independence. (Hendriks, 2010)

The most visible effect of the authoritarian regime of Kenya’s President Daniel Arap Moi is the rapid expansion of ‘dramatically underserviced informal settlements, not only on colonial Nairobi’s “African” eastern side but also in deeply stressed pockets amid the wealthiest areas of the city to the west.’ (Myers, 2014) He ruled within the constitution of a single party state, related to the establishment of the Kenya African Socialist Alliance (KASA). There was a deterioration of the relations between state and society and a lot of dictatorial excesses of power and political violence by the autocratic regime. Alternative views were shut down through banishment from the party and detention by the state (Mitullah et al. 2004).

This oppression eventually resulted in the ‘second liberation’ and pressured democracy through implementing a multi-party formation called the New Democratic Movement (NDP) and the Forum for the Restoration of Democracy (FORD) - ‘a forum predominantly united to get rid of the Moi government and KANU (Kenya African National Union)- led by

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the former KPU (Kenya People’s Union) and KASA leader Oginga Odinga.’ (Hendriks, 2010, p.98)

Thus, from 2002 to 2009 Kenya was again ruled by as a multi-party state. It went together with renewed optimism to reduce corruption and make people more accountable for corruption and fraud in politics but also in daily life. However Kibaki’s rule carried things forward and economic inequity increased along ethnic and geographic lines. He continued further politicization and the country’s division increased even more because of this power controversy. This resulted in new elections in December 2007 and eventually in the politically instigated violent December 2007 post-election crisis. At least 1.000 citizens were killed and it resulted in 600.000 internally displaced persons. (Hendriks, 2010)

2.1.1 Movement to devolution; more power for the counties

Kramon and Posner (2011) explain what happens after and the rise and reasons behind Kenya’s new constitution. In Augustus 2010 the Kenyan population voted overwhelmingly in a national referendum to adopt a new constitution. (Kramon and Posner, 2011) This was the outcome of a process that began when UN secretary Kofi Annan helped develop a resolution after the violent conflict that followed the disputed December 2007 general election. ‘By reducing the power of the executive, devolving authority to subnational units, and formally guaranteeing a host of social and economic rights to women, minorities, and marginalized communities, the constitution has the potential to transform Kenyan politics—not least by diminishing the role that ethnicity plays in the country’s affairs.’ (Kramon and Posner, 2011, p.3)

The new 2010 Constitution of Kenya shifted local governance from decentralized to devolved governance. This means that central government function, such as public services provision, is now the responsibility of the County governments. (Barett, 2015) Devolution can be described as ‘a firmer, deeper, and more institutionalized transfer of political power to localities than decentralization that moves prioritization of development activities closer to those in need and structures accountability.’ (Barett, 2015, p.8) The counties are now single member constituencies for the election of members of parliament to the Senate of Kenya. Since 2013 there are now 47 official counties and their governments bare the responsibilities now that are transferred from the national government.

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Challenges of the new constitution

So for this research it is interesting what these processes of democratization and decentralization mean for public services and municipal waste management. The challenges will be shortly introduced here, the theoretical debate is set out in the next chapter and then chapter 7 will elaborate further on the implications for the waste management in the case of Nairobi.

The Nairobi province was changed to Nairobi County with the new constitution. They kept the local council they had in tact: City Council of Nairobi (CCN). ‘It performs the mandatory functions such as provision of public health and primary educational facilities, maintenance and repair of urban roads, and burial of destitute. It has permissive functions, which include administrative activities, sewerage and drainage, water supply, collection of garbage, markets, and social welfare services. Day-to-day operations of CCN are carried out by the non-executive mayor and elected and nominated councillors. The executive role is performed by the Town Clerk appointed by the Ministry of Local Government.’ (Hendriks, 2010, p.162) The CCN has always been sensitive for political influences of the leading parties. While it is intended to enhance efficiency of council operations, lack of resources make it that they allow political parties’ interference. This encourages patronage relationships between CCN employees and politicians, along ethnic and religious lines. (Hendriks, 2010) Improving capacity of the CCN is difficult as 60% of the financial recourses is spent on salaries, which leaves 40% only to really invest in operations, maintenance and service delivery. (UN Habitat, 2006). ‘Ineffective and inefficient bureaucracy undermine CCN’s operations.’ (Hendriks, 2010)

With the new county structure, planning officials expressed uncertainty, how can these new levels of government be successful and how can the negations succeed over how to divide power and responsibility for a host of public services? (Kramon and Posner, 2011) Deficiencies in the overall structure of CCN and its management and corruption scandals have led to distrust among the inhabitants of the city. The lack of expectations of the citizens and the failure of the CCN to manage the city adequately will become clear later in this research.

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2.2 Kiambu County

The research on production level has been conducted in Kiambu County. A short introduction of the county is given here to understand the context of the actors: the farmers, on this level. The county of Kiambu borders the city of Nairobi at the northeast and it occupies 2543 km2, with 8 constituencies and a total population of around 1,6 million inhabitants. The main economic activity is farming and the county holds a lot of small-scale farming. (SNV, 2016) The smallholder farmers in this area provide mainly to local markets and the markets in the city of Nairobi; which makes it an interesting research area for the theme of ‘feeding the city’. The cities in the county, Kiambu, Karuri, Limuru, Thika, Ruiru and Kikuyu, are satellite towns that are also experiencing rapid expansion rates. (Omwenga, 2008) This land expansion of the urban areas is a threat to farmers, turning farming area into real estate. Still, a lot of the counties inhabitants are farmers. Kiambu’s farmers are mostly small-scale, 82 % of the farmers owns less than 2 acres, which results in high land fragmentation. (Makokha et al., 2001)

Kiambu is divided in four broad topographic zones, which have highly fertile to moderate fertile soils. The rainfall mostly determines the climate, with a bimodal rainfall pattern with 750 mm in the lower areas and 1300 mm annually in the upper regions. There are long rains from April to May, with a cool season during July and August and short rains between October and November. The different zones are sub-humid and have an annual mean temperature of 10–20° C which makes the area suitable for farming. (Odhong et al, 2014) The agricultural land use in Kiambu County relies on weather patterns, soil, market demand and water availability. (SNV, 2016) The major crops of production are kales, cabbages, maize, onions, potatoes, tomatoes, sorghum, tea and coffee. The vegetable production is mostly done on open fields, however there is a rise in horticulture and greenhouse farming. Additionally a lot of farmers combine the farming of crops with small-scale dairy farming. The economical position and potential of Kiambu County is positive, the biggest advantage is the proximity of the city Nairobi. The city is the most important market for the farmers and demand is abundant. The biggest export products are tea and coffee and have often been named success stories for the economy of Kenya. Another advantage is the high amount of knowledge institutes within the county, both public and private. But also being nearby the capital city, the inhabitants benefit of the educational institutions in the city. (AWSC, 2014)

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Image 1. Kiambu County (Google Earth, 2016)

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3. Theoretical framework

3.1 Introduction

To put the issues of post-harvest losses into context, the topical debates around governance of waste management in municipal settings are important. Nowadays there is more discussion than ever on how to achieve full sustainability in our food systems, but in this theoretical chapter it will be explained how reducing post-harvest losses can be helpful to achieve this. It starts by setting out the debates on decentralization in developing countries and how this has led to declining waste management governance. Thereafter the scientific relevance is given on the issues around post-harvest losses in the supply chains, what literature says about the causes and what the strategies could be to reduce these losses. The chapter ends with the conceptual model used for this research and the conclusion of the theoretical context.

3.2 Decentralization in waste management

Developments of democratization and decentralization have been central in international development debates in the last two decades. (Hendriks, 2010) Since there is an international development agenda that focuses on good governance, privatisation and bottom-up empowerment, there already have been critiques. There are mixed results from this decentralization agenda and especially in developing countries where decentralization has not been successful in most cases.

Decentralization is often considered in development and governance literature to be the best way to improve the efficiency of providing public services; like waste management. In this idea, responsibility should lie with the closest appropriate level consistent with efficient and cost-effective delivery of services. (Hendriks, 2010) Because local governments are closest to the citizens they were considered as the best party in the best position to assess their needs and preferences. They were considered in a better position than state officials to make decisions over the distribution and allocation of resources and that accountability and performance of the management of public services would increase in their hands. (Hendriks, 2010) Thus, the definition of decentralization is the transfer of

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responsibilities for public functions and services from central government to lower levels of government. (Hendriks, 2010)

This decentralization is also related with a shift of power from government to (local) governance. The concepts of government and governance are broad and have been interpreted and explained thoroughly through the years. Government can be explained as; ‘the formal institutions of the state that perform the action of governing based on their monopoly of legitimate coercive power within a demarcated territory.’ (Stoker, 1998 in Hendriks, 2010, p.30) Governance could be generally defined as: ‘the exercise of political, economic and administrative authority to manage a country’s affairs at all levels and the means by which states promote social cohesion and integration and ensure the well-being of their population.’ (UNDP, 2006, p.3) At its core, governance addresses the problem of economic and political coordination in social life (Brige and Perreault, 2009), and takes the form of ‘multi-actor arrangements that takes an attempt at coordinating public and private interests, actions and resources.’ (Pierre & Peters, 2000 in Hendriks, 2010, p.32) The concept of governance problematizes ideas of state-centric regulation and power and puts emphasis on decentralizing this power through recognizing multi-layered political authorities that should operate on several different spatial scales. (Lemos and Agrawal, 2006) Governance also often highlights how out-dated policy frameworks are and points out the importance of non-state, non-traditional actors such as social movements, Ngo’s and sub-national administrative units. (Bridge and Perreault, 2009)

3.2.1 Challenges in governance

However, this shift to governance also means that boundaries between public and private tasks can become vague and results in that important tasks like public services and waste management are not properly governed. The new government pattern does not collide with the emerging developing countries. Issues of responsibility and justice on different scales have been questioned after failings of governance arrangements. Thus, the limitations of this discourse initiated a whole new line of theories in this debate, which are especially interesting for this research.

Swyngedouw gives a critical perspective on decentralization models: There are risks that need to be considered in giving power to neo-liberal market forces that then set the rules of the game. These unauthorised actors may be catalysers of conflict when they have too much power without control by the state. Swyngedouw indicates that these new forms of institutions of governance decrease transparency, are too ad-hoc and profit oriented and

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that questions arise about ‘inclusiveness, legitimacy, representation scale of operation and internal/external accountability.’ (Swyngedouw in Hendriks, 2010, p.33) It is interesting how Swyngedouw believes that giving governance power to multiple actors goes against democracy where participation of the society gets more limited ‘in terms of who can, is, or will be allowed to participate which in turn is related to power and status’. (Hendriks, 2010, p.33)

This research contributes to these debates in literature by taking this critical stance towards decentralization developments because there has been no positive structural change in the waste management in African cities. The difficulty developing countries face in managing resources is maybe a reason a strong body of power like a national government is still needed to manage public services properly. Governance can be used as a neoliberal instrument but becomes limited when local governments have no money, resources and knowledge. Still, it must be said that the aspect of scalar politics is important in a study around food chains when the connection between rural and urban has to be made and when this moves across national, regional and city scale.

The research will involve looking at the shuffling of power through the different actors on the different scales. Cities have been often considered the heart of the debates on scale and sustainability when they function as highly skilled and educated node in the region and country. (Bulkeley, 2005) This is why Nairobi and its cities policies on waste management will also be examined.

3.3 Sustainability of the food system

Waste management is seen as an important factor in making the food system sustainable. Only recently the relevance of circularity in the food system, thus realizing the importance of managing waste, has become clearer. This links the discussion of post-harvest crop losses in developing countries to waste management policies that are failing due to decentralizing governance policies. Interesting is in these discussions about sustainable food systems (SFS’s) and post-harvest losses is that the authors mostly write about food security.

Ericksen argues in his research that our food systems should be considered in their entirety. ‘It is a system where all the elements (environment, people, inputs, processes,

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infrastructures, institutions, etc.) and activities that relate to the production, processing, distribution, preparation and consumption of food and the outputs of these activities, including socio-economic and environmental outcomes are put together’. (Ericksen, 2011, p.1) Food systems include the governance of marketing, processing, transporting, accessing and consuming of food through institutions, technologies and practices. (Ibid, 2011) According to the High Level Panel of Experts (HLPE) report a sustainable food system (SFS) is: ‘a food system that ensures food security and nutrition for all in such a way that the economic, social and environmental bases to generate food security and nutrition of future generations are not compromised.’ (HLPE, 2014, p.31)

The literature on ‘post-harvest losses’ focused on examining it in quantities in the context of increasing food security. Achieving food security, to end hunger and achieve food availability for all, has been mostly focusing on increasing agricultural production. However, producing more food alone will not be sufficient to achieve food security. It requires transition towards more sustainable food consumption patterns and diets and working on both sides of the food chain i.e. food production and food consumption (Capone et al., 2016). However, recently more attention has to be devoted to another component of possibly increasing food security; reducing food waste and losses. About a third of the global food production is lost or wasted with severe impacts on the world’s economy and environment. (Gustavsson et al., 2011) So there is huge potential in reducing food losses in order to gain food security and sustainable food chains. The authors Gustavsson et al. (2011), Kosseva (2013) and Gogh et al. (2013) believe that this is a problem especially in developing countries. In relation to the sustainability of food systems, food losses thus hinder reaching the goal of ensuring sustainable food security.

This view on sustainable food chains matches the growing consensus amongst scientists that this system needs reconsideration and deep structural changes to ensure food security around the world. (Pimbert, 2016) However, for this study post-harvest losses were examined not per se in the light of achieving food security. For this study the post-harvest losses were an important indicator to see how decentralization politics influenced the causes of the losses and strategies to reduce these. Waste management and reducing food losses should therefore be more often included in food sustainability aspirations.

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3.4 Post-harvest losses in fresh food supply chains in developing

countries

This section aims to explain the concepts of supply chains and of post-harvest losses and shows why it is an issue in developing countries like Kenya. With ‘supply chains’ the flow of food is meant that begins at producer level and ends at the consumer. In this case the supply chain of fresh fruits and vegetables is examined that flow from Kiambu County to the city of Nairobi. The chain starts at production level, with farmers growing the crops. In the middle are the steps of transporting, processing, storing, wholesaling, selling, buying, packaging, checking and monitoring. (KIT, 2006 and Haggblade, 2012) Important in this study on post-harvest losses is that in the vertical structure of the value chains; only the processes from farming to retail level will be analyzed, also referred to as the ‘postharvest’ chain.

Despite efforts of all the actors, food spoils in this post-harvest chain. In most literature the concept of ‘food loss’ distinguishes itself from the more common or overarching concept of ‘food waste’. ‘Food waste refers to food appropriate for human consumption being discarded or left to spoil at consumer level – regardless of the cause.’ (HLPE, 2014, p.24) Food losses happen in earlier stages, prior to the consumer level and post-harvest and it refers to food that falls out of the chain due to immaturity, cuts, bruise, damage and rotten crop, water loss, disease, greening process, heat or temperature, transport and market conditions.

Fresh supply chains in developing countries are characterised by relatively high losses that take place in all the steps and processes between harvest and consumption. (Gogh, 2013) Although data on postharvest losses in low-income countries are scarce and difficult to verify, consensus exists among postharvest experts that losses are relatively high compared to developed countries. Estimates between 20% and 50% of food produce that is lost are given, mainly during the early and middle stages of the supply chain. (Kosseva, 2013) This difference between where the waste and losses occur most often is shown in the graph below. It shows that most food loss occurs at on-farm and transport and processing level in developing countries while in developed countries in happens at the home and municipal level. For this reason in this research the case study was done on production level and marketing and selling level. The actors on this level that are therefore important are farmers, wholesalers and vendors.

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Figure 1. Difference losses developed vs. developing countries. (Charles et al, 2010)

3.4.1 Causes at different levels

The table below shows the causes of losses given by multiple researchers and reports. Multiple levels know the same type of causes. As said in the previous section losses are referred to as immature, cut, bruised, damaged and rotten products. (Affognan, 2015)

Gogh et al. name the most important causes for postharvest food losses: ‘lack of proper transport methods’ (no climate control), closely followed by the categories ‘storage facilities’ and ‘postharvest product handling’. (Gogh et al., 2013, p.29)

He explains that during transport in developing countries transport trucks are often not designed for transport of fresh produce, as well as the chain is too long thus it passes too many facilities before coming at consumer level. All the storages, processing facilities often do not have cooled rooms, which causes losses easier. (Gogh et al., 2013) ‘Highly perishable produce requires adequate storage facilities with well-maintained conditions, mainly temperature, relative humidity and gas composition.’ (HLPE, 2014, p.43)

During transportation, on processing, wholesale and retail level losses increase due to rough and improper handling of the produce. Also the quality of roads can be a cause of the increasement of losses; this is particular a problem in rainy seasons. Processors and wholesalers often don’t have suitable packaging. What happens a lot is the overfilling of product packages causing bruising and punctures in the perishable products. (Gogh et al., 2013 and HLPE, 2014)

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Table 1. Causes of losses on different levels in the supply chain. (Author, 2016 Adapted from: HLPE, 2014, Hodges, 2010 and Gogh, 2013) Level in chain Causes of losses Post Harvest (on farm) Unfavourable weather, climate and temperature Lack of/no proper storage Quality standards Inefficient crop management and harvesting Transport level Bad infrastructure, poor roads Lack of proper transport vehicles and cooled transport Unfavourable weather, climate and temperature Spillage, leakage Bruising because of rough handling of produce Processing and wholesale level No proper storage Poor packaging Technical malfunction Excessive peeling, washing Quality standards Retail level No proper storage Demand and competition Unfavourable weather, climate and temperature Quality standards Spoilage, rotting On farm lack of storage and inefficient crop management (like premature harvesting) is the biggest problem. (Gogh, 2013 and HLPE, 2014) Hodges et al. (2010) mention about unfavorable weather on production level: ‘Weather is a key issue. In developing countries with hot climates, most farmers rely on sun drying to ensure that crops are well dried before storage. If unfavorable weather conditions prevent crops from drying sufficiently, then losses will be high. If climate change leads to more unstable weather, including damper or cloudier conditions, PHLs may increase.’ (Hodges, 2010, p.3) But, unreliable weather is an influence that causes losses at every level in the supply chain.

An important factor that all authors stress is the general lack of market information and the effect of the low pricing when it is peak season. Demand and prices are therefore very versatile and it is difficult for producers and vendors to keep up and have a reliable income.

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During peak season the market will be full with the same products, this abundance of produce causes surpluses in the market and prices to go down, creating losses of unsold produce. (Gogh, 2013) Quality standards are also affecting losses when the standards are set too high for the farmers to meet. This is particularly relevant for export but with the increasing role of supermarkets in Nairobi this could also be of influence for the famers in Kiambu County. (Gogh, 2013)

When the produce reaches retail level it has passed all levels above and is often in the last stage and, as a perishable product, almost reached full ripeness. The conditions on the market influence whether the vendor has to throw away a lot or not. High temperatures and lack of humidity control are the major causes of losses on this level. (HLPE, 2014) This is the one of the only reports that mentions causes of losses on wholesaler and retail level. It means that by asking the actors on these levels about the causes of losses and their strategies to reduce it will provide new information and fill in a gap in literature.

3.4.2 Strategies of actors in the supply chain

Talking about governance in dealing with waste and losses there is a self-governance aspect that is of interest in this research. Because the decentralization politics and the failure to manage waste properly in the supply chain it is often left to the actors in the levels of the supply chain to dispose of the losses and waste.

Here, the circularity in the food chain becomes relevant because the research looks at fruits and vegetables, considering these are biodegradable products that can be well recycled and processed into new resources. For instance many authors mention the different opportunities of self-management to reduce and handle this type of waste. (HLPE, 2014, Hodges et al., 2010, Papargyropoulou et al., 2014 and Gogh et al., 2013) ‘Food use hierarchies’ have been developed and in line with an overall pattern of waste management, they all more or less follow the same structure. This hierarchy is shown in Figure 2 below and holds strategies to dispose losses, from most preferred to least preferred options. The most preferred is supporting prevention of losses and waste; second, facilitate the distribution of still edible but not marketable food such as by means of food banks or other institutions to that effect; third, for what is left, use as animal feed; fourth, use as compost and/or to generate energy and using disposal in landfills as the least preferred option. (HLPE, 2014)

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Although this is a waste policy recommendation document, this logic can be applied into bigger waste management of a city like Nairobi. The priorities of this hierarchy should also be followed in municipal waste management to ensure a sustainable food system: ‘(i) avoid waste generation; (ii) manage waste as a resource; and (iii) ensure efficient, safe and environmentally sound treatment, reuse, and, ultimately, if needed, disposal of waste.’ (HLPE, 2014, p.80) Figure 2. Hierarchy of managing food waste from preferred to least preferred options (Author, 2016, Adapted from HLPE, 2014, Hodges et al., 2010, Gogh et al., 2013 and Papargyropoulou et al., 2014) Hodges et al. (2010) mention how governance on higher institutional levels can be done to deal with losses. He describes in the research how different improvements in the structure of the country are necessary for reducing post-harvest losses. Considerable investments have to be made in the post-harvest systems of developing countries to create more formal markets and improve their performance to a point where PHLs can be substantially reduced. (Hodges, 2010)

Improvements could be in line of developing all-weather roads so that the products can get to the market, a problem especially acute in Africa where transport costs can be five times those in Asia. (World Bank, 2009 in Hodges, 2010) Market institutions must be made suitable for the African city context. For instance, by developing and promoting marketing groups and promoting collective marketing to respond to the unreliable market demands. Prevention (reduce volume of surplus) Food redistribution (feed people in need through charity) Food redistribution (feed animals and cattle) Industrial reuse (to produce fertilizer or provide energy sources) Composting (Create nutrient-rich sol amendment) Disposal (to landuill)

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Adopting innovative technologies can strengthen this, for instance innovation systems could lower post-harvest losses when there is more transparency in market information. When there is a consistent supply of information it can provide clarity in what the demand exactly that will ensure better-quality and better quantity distribution and thus reduce losses. There is a wide range of technologies named by authors to reduce post-harvest losses. It is definitely relevant for this research, however goes beyond the scope of this theoretical debate.

3.5 Conceptual model

The main concepts in this research are conceptualized in the illustration below. It starts with the theory of decentralization that affects the Waste Management Governance of the city of Nairobi. It will be seen how much it has influenced waste governance by talking to the actors in the supply chain. The actors that are part of the research are farmers on production level and traders and vendors on marketing and selling level. This means the research has an actor-based approach of looking at the waste management issues in the supply chains of Nairobi.

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3.6 Conclusion

This thesis follows this framework of concepts (figure 3) and will try to add to the literature on decentralization in waste management by taking an actor-based approach. It tries to fill the gap in several ways.

First, this research will follow the critical approach on decentralizing public services like waste management. The challenges around losses and waste that the city faces have to be addressed more thoroughly by looking at other aspects, for instance what the reasons behind the losses are and what strategies work best to reduce it. When there is declining government involvement in the processes of the supply chain, these actors of this process are also left with declining investments and have to figure ways out to deal with the problems themselves. Addressing these strategies of the actors in the chain may or may not show us how they try to solve and reduce the losses. It will also give new insights in the governance literature and debates as it not looks at governance as system and institutions but as governance forms that try to fill the gap of failed decentralization in waste management.

Additionally, another interesting gap in literature and researches on losses is found after this literature review. Every research mentioned the difficulties the actors face on production and transport level, while looking at these issues at selling level has not been researched as much. This research tries to add this information; how do vendors on retail markets experience losses and waste on their markets? Studying this problem in the context of markets will be a valuable addition to the debates.

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4. Methodology

4.1 Introduction

This chapter will explain and justify the methodologies for this research. It starts by operationalizing the main concepts of the research question and the conceptual model. Then it will continue with outlining the research design and the ways that the data has been collected and analysed per unit of analysis. It concludes with the validity, reliability, limitations and the ethical aspects of the research.

This research has been explorative and conducting fieldwork has had an impact on the research methodologies. The track of the research changed several times, my assumptions and hypothesis were often wrong and this had the interesting effect that I wanted to dive deeper in the reasons behind these assumptions. This is the reason why this research first has an in-depth bottom-up, actor based approach but ends up zooming out again to find out what the overarching reasons are.

4.2 Research design

The design is a case study design with an inductive nature and an interpretivist approach. (Bryman, 2012) It will try to make an understanding of the social specific context by researching this topic through the interpretation of the respondents about causes and strategies around losses. However the inductive nature has its nuance because this research draws on existing knowledge and theories, which are needed as orientation before going into the field. This is why several assumptions are set up drawn from the theoretical chapter and operationalization.

1. At production level the causes of losses are mainly due to poor crop management, lack of/no proper storage, unfavourable weather, climate and temperature, lack of transportation methods, poor infrastructure, quality standards and marketing issues. 2. At the production level in the supply chain farmers do not have adequate strategies to deal with losses and aren’t aware of the losses further down the supply chain.

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3. At marketing and selling level the causes of losses are mainly due to lack of proper transport, poor infrastructure, spillage, leakage and bruising because of rough handling of produce and poor packaging, unfavourable weather, climate and temperature, no proper storage, overflow of high season produce and competition.

4. At marketing and selling level in the supply chain traders and vendors do have more strategies to deal with losses, and know more about the quantities and implications of losses in the chain. 5. Decentralization politics in Kenya influenced the urban waste management of Nairobi in a negative way. Research question and sub-questions The research question for this research is formulated as follows:

How are post-harvest losses managed by the actors, producers, wholesalers and sellers, involved in Nairobi’s fresh fruit supply chains in the context of the city’s waste management governance? The following sub-questions are set up to answer the research question: 1. What are main causes of post-harvest losses and what are the strategies to deal with the losses at production level? 2. What are main causes of post-harvest losses and what are the strategies to deal with the losses at marketing and selling level? 3. How does the movement to decentralization influence the waste management in the city of Nairobi?

4.3 Operationalization

The following section outlines the operationalization of core concepts of the research question that stood central in the actor-based data collection: ‘causes for post-harvest losses’ and ‘strategies to deal with post-harvest losses’.

The concepts have been subdivided to make sure external validity can be met and to show how the variables and indicators were of importance in this research. The operationalization tables can be found in appendix 1.

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Causes for post-harvest losses

This concept is subdivided through the two levels of the supply chain that have been researched; production level and marketing and selling level. The production level has been subdivided into ‘on farm practices’ that could affect the losses post harvest, and ‘from the farm’ processes that could influence the losses at this stage. Indicators that are examined that influence losses ‘on farm’ are crop management, storage and weather conditions. Indicators that influence losses ‘from farm’ are quality standards, transport, marketing and weather conditions. On marketing and selling level the subdivision is made between the wholesaler companies and markets and the retail markets. This will make clear what the causes for losses are in the middle of the chain before it reaches consumers. The indicators to find out what the causes of losses here will be about infrastructure, transport, packaging, weather and overflow and competition.

Strategies to deal with post-harvest losses

Looking at the other important concept of this research the same subdivision in levels is made; production level and marketing and selling level. The research will try to figure out what the strategies of the actors on these levels are when it comes to dealing with losses. On every level the actors had different ways of dealing with the losses, it was either about really reducing the losses, about coping with the losses or they only had disposal strategies. The indicators used to see if the actors on production level had strategies to reduce losses were: crop management and storage. For disposing the following indicators were used: donation, reuse (industrial, manure, cattle feed) and dumping. Indicators for coping strategies were: giving extra produce and increasing prices.

On marketing and selling level similar indicators were of importance. The indicators used or reducing strategies were about storage and market conditions. The following indicators were used for disposing strategies: donation, reuse (industrial, manure, cattle feed), dumping and selling. Indicators for coping strategies on this level were also about: giving extra produce and increasing prices.

4.4 Units of analysis

The units of analyses are the actors on the two different levels in the chain. This means the units of analysis differ per level. On production level the actors that I’ve spoken to were the farmers. The farmers were randomly found and not selected. I found some farmers through the markets where I conducted questionnaires (see next paragraph) but also some by

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attending to a farmers training organized by the Dutch NGO SNV. (see next paragraph and table in appendix 2) On marketing and selling level the actors that were interviewed and surveyed were traders and vendors. Both respondents on wholesale level were found through snowball sampling. The vendors (n=51) were found through random sampling; asking around on the market itself if a vendor was willing to help me with my research..The markets were chosen based on proximity to Kiambu, secondary data and with help of the students of the TUK.

4.5 Data collection

The study follows a mixed method approach with qualitative and quantitative data collection methods. Additionally (participatory) observations were important to ensure triangulation to understand the setting; the local social and cultural context of the research. Participating in the setting the researcher is able to observe and learn about the culture of a certain social group, i.e. farmers in Kiambu County or vendors on the open markets. (Bryman, 2012) Trying to look through the eyes of the interviewees will help in the bottom up view and aim of this study; in this way information could arise which was not expected to be found as an outsider. (Ibid) The fieldwork was carried out from 14th of March to the

2nd of May in the year 2016 in the city of Nairobi in Kenya.

Data collection started off with in depth interviews and meetings with experts (see appendix x for information on all respondents), eventually these ended up very valuable interviews giving me insights on the background issues relevant for my topic. Their opinions gave me the chance to really hear what they found important etc. These in-depth interviews with experts were found through purposive sampling and found through Internet or snowballing.

Data collection was actor-focused and was done differently per actor on production, marketing and selling level. The reasons behind this are that the specific situations of the fieldwork resulted in a change of orientation of the main actor in this research. Initially the purpose of the study was only to ask the farmers about their strategies to reduce post-harvest losses. However after the first orientation meetings and expert interviews during the fieldwork period, a preliminary conclusion arose that the farmers in Kiambu County are not very much aware of how the chain of their crop proceeded exactly and that they do not

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know about the losses in the whole of the chain. Therefore the research focus shifted into also gaining information from the other actors in the supply chain about losses and about the flows and flaws of the supply chain. This meant that I also went to market vendors and wholesalers to try to gain this information. Eventually because of these specific situations and limitations it resulted in differing data collection methods per actor.

To answer the first sub-question the following data collection has been done. Semi-structured interviews on losses on production level were held with farmers in Kiambu County and contained closed and open questions. This was done so that there was structure in the set of questions but the respondents would still feel that he/she could openly respond and talk about the topics. Also it made room for me as an interviewer to ask more questions to explore the topic in more detail. (Harvey, 2016) Some questions could be answered through likert-scale because it was easier to get quick opinions about the topics in this way.

To answer the second sub-question two different type of actors needed to be questioned; wholesalers on marketing level and market vendors or selling level; the following paragraphs explains how data was collected on these levels.

To gain the necessary information for this research I found two different types of wholesalers and I conducted an in-depth interview with both. The first was a private company that got fruits and vegetables delivered by local farmers in Kiambu County and only sold it to one local supermarket chain, popular in the city of Nairobi. This was interesting because they were an example of an actor in the middle of the local supply chain, which obtained a lot of their supply from local farmers from Kiambu County and therefore was expected to have a lot of knowledge on losses and strategies to reduce these. Also the manager of a public wholesale market that functioned as central most important bulk market of Nairobi was interviewed. On this wholesale market, Wakulima Market, I obtained a lot of knowledge on how they deal with losses, about waste management by the private and public sectors in Nairobi, on how they deal with the growing demand of food and their role in the city. The questionnaire that was held on the markets with the market vendors was divided in questions about the origin of the food produce, background information on losses and their opinion on this, in disposal strategies of losses after transportation level and disposal strategies of losses at selling level.

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The third sub-question, on waste management, is a question that only emerged in the later stadium of this research. Chapter 7 was written mainly to explain the findings of the conclusions of the previous sub-questions. After most interviews and data collection was done the reasons behind the causes and why the actors followed certain strategies became interesting. To put the story into context, the data for this chapter was mostly collected through secondary data and document analysis. An examination of a variety of documents was done, from government policy documents and research reports on waste management in Nairobi.

A key limitation to document analysis is fact that many documents may be out of date (Hakim, 2000). For example, a lot of the documents analyzed were from before the new political constituencies were put in place in Kenya. So even though it was relevant to read about the waste management before the changes, there was little written on the effects on losses and waste in the city.

Not all the units of observation were asked for background information. Only for the farmers in the Kiambu gender, age and income were asked because from literature these factors could be important to understand the context of production issues. Personal characteristics of the producer had barely any relevance for the scope of this research.

4.6 Data analysis

The interviews were recorded with an iPhone and further materials included paper and pens to take notes. To deal with respondents that are not able to speak English the help of local students of the Technical university of Kenya (TUK) was necessary in some situations. The recordings were important to analyze the collected data. The methods that are used are compatible with the qualitative and quantitative nature of the data. The semi-structured questionnaires and interviews that are recorded have been transcribed and analysed through coding. The coding is done with the program Atlas-Ti. Important for this coding process was post-coding; after coding all the interviews, categories were made so that it was possible to arrange the codes in order to answer the sub questions of the research.

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The structured questionnaires on the markets are analysed through the statistical program SPSS. Unfortunately the amount of respondents was often not high enough to get high significance levels but for this research it was more relevant to show if the assumptions were correct and to help my the research orientation. The raw data is presented with frequency tables and charts, and crosstabs to find if there is any association between variables. Drawing conclusions from these crosstabs is challenging and it will mostly only show an estimation to see if the given hypotheses were correct. This is mainly due to the fact the amount of respondents is too low to make generalizations. Therefore the association levels will only be helpful to show the direction of association and significance levels will not be important for the relevance of the findings. The associations in the crosstabs will be calculated with Cramers V because almost all the variables are nominal. Even if a nominal variable is analysed with an ordinal variable it was chosen to use a nominal measure method.

4.7 Validity and reliability

Because this study focuses on mixed-methods it is easier to reach internal and external validity. Triangulation increases the internal validity of the results. (Bryman, 2012)

External validity will be harder to achieve when qualitative methods take the overhand. Due to the specific context of the research it is hard generalizing the study context to other places and times. This is why the operationalization table is of importance that makes it possible to follow the same steps of this research. There is always a threat of making a wrong generalization; it could be that it only works in that specific location. In this research the places around Nairobi are very specific in its environmental, social and economic contexts. These factors will probably be stronger for smallholder farmers in Kiambu County because this rural area they live and produce in is closer to the city of Nairobi; that means that their markets and consumers are always nearby. While smallholder farmers further away from the city will have other environmental, social and economic conditions. Reliability in this research will also be difficult; it cannot be calculated, only estimated. In order to replicate the study to make the outcomes stronger, all the measures should be repeatable thus it is important to clearly outline all the steps of the research. (see operationalization table) But to reach the same outcome as the first time the research was conducted is complex because you cannot copy the exact conditions of the first research.

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4.8 Limitations and ethical aspects

In doing fieldwork different limitations will occur and taking ethical aspects into account is important. The first limitation would be the short time span of the fieldwork. Collecting data in only 5 weeks is a very short time and could have lead to incorrect analysis. It also should be taken into account that as a researcher I could have an impact on the locals. My own subjectivity could have caused a bias is some situations, plus the subjectivity of the students of the TUK assisting me could have affected me. Also when they translated the local language, Swahili, for me, I might have lost important nuances that the respondent is telling. Bryman (2012) lays out the important ethical considerations to take into account when doing data collection. Confidentiality and privacy is very important in doing fieldwork. Privacy was respected and anonymity and guaranteeing confidentiality was promised to help also in creating trust. The latter was especially important when conducting interviews that were recorded. This made the respondents more willing to cooperate and there were no respondents that didn’t want to participate or withdraw from the research.

Another limitation of the research was the sampling that has been done. Most of the respondents were chosen out of convenience, due to the lack of time and the lack of travel opportunities. This is also a limitation for the validity and reliability of the research and makes it less representative.

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