The demand for organic foods seems to be on an upward trend in the city with new restaurants popping up and Kenyans of middle class drifting towards consumption of these foodstuffs.

A spot-check in the city by the AWC found supermarkets now stocking organic groceries more than ever before, while restaurants specializing in these foods enjoying increasing popularity.

At the Nakumatt Ukay in Westlands, organic Lettuces, Spinach, and Rucola vegetables crowd the shelves. They are all labeled organic to help customers not to confuse them with any other conventionally grown vegetables.

Customers who buy them say they are at least assured that they are not polluted with artificial fertilizers and pesticides used to grow and preserve other vegetables and fruits.

“Although they are a bit expensive, the reason I like organic vegetables is they are in their natural form and have no pesticide residues,” says one of the customers who identified herself as Anish, while buying organic spinach at the Supermarket.  

Organic food restaurants are too smiling all the way to the bank as the organic bug catches more Nairobians. At one of the restaurants, a waiter said the number of their clients has doubled in the past one year. Majority of those who patronize this restaurant are middle class workers.

“During lunch-time, it is sometimes difficult to get a sitting space as customers flock here in huge numbers,” says the waiter.

A visit to the same restaurant at lunch time confirmed the waiters’ assertions; customers streaming in, in hordes.

At another restaurant, Bridges Organic Restaurants, the operations manager, Paul Kioko says the demand for their foods has more than tripled since they opened in 2006. The huge demand has forced them to open another restaurant in Upper Hill area to cater for those clients who are unable to get to the city centre or find packing.             

“Kenyans are more cautious about their health, and anything that is purely natural and chemical free is the one they will go for,” he says.

“Our foods are more nutritious and offer greater benefits to people with chronic illness such as diabetes who are very guarded about what they eat.”

The menu at Kioko’s restaurant has everything ranging from Soya meat curry, brown rice, green maize omelette, organic egg curry, organic fish curry, diabetic githeri, diabetic pancakes, organic eggs, organic sweet potatoe mandazi, organic cocktail tea, Aloe Vera and orange fruits, organic carrot fruits, organic immune boosters and organic uric acid controller among many others. All these foods bear a prefix Organic to indicate that they have adhered to the organic farming and processing stipulations.

Although some people may confuse restaurants selling traditional foods as organic, the latter have a distinct way of how they prepare their food: No fat, for instance, is used in cooking most of the foods like rice, chicken, and vegetables.

Traditionally prepared honey instead of sugar is used for tea and porridge. Most of the foods are cooked in their natural forms, with milk being used in some instances to enhance their quality.

But what is also interesting is majority of those who eat at this restaurants are people aged over 35 years. Kioko thinks the reason why many young people are not eating in these restaurants is because they do not understand the nutritional value of organic foods.

“Young people relish fatty and sugary foods which are not found in organic restaurants,” he adds.

But other people think the reason why youth and other lowly paid Kenyans avoid these restaurants is because of the prices they charge.

In such restaurants, a good meal goes for over Ksh 700, when the same food, but which is considered non-organic, costs about Sh 300 or less in other restaurants.

In fact, most of organic food sell for two and half times the price of other foods. Still, Kioko argues that their prices are not exorbitant as people think as they go at the same rate as those charged by other restaurants.

There are those people who go to these restaurants for breakfast, lunch and dinner; just to be sure what they take is organic.

Kioko insists organic foods are better than conventionally grown, particularly in Kenya where there are no tough controls on the amount of pesticide residues in the crops.

But for some consumers of these foodstuffs, it is difficult to tell if what is labeled or claimed to be organic food is indeed organic.

“Many times we just eat these foods as an act of faith because you do not know whether what is said on the package or what is claimed by these restaurants is indeed organic,” Said Josephine Odero, a frequent buyer of these foods.

Indeed, even established regulators of organic food such as the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) warn that:

“Just because a product says it is organic or contains organic ingredients does not necessarily mean it is a healthier alternative. Some organic products may still be high in sugar, salt, fat or calories.”

The vexing question then is, how do you prove these products are organic? Some restaurants and vegetable vendors in rich neighbourhoods say they have specific farmers who supply them with organic produce, making it easy to know how the foods are grown and processed.

Kioko on the other hand says all their suppliers have to be certified by Kenya Organic Agriculture Network, which regulates the growing and processing of organic foods. It is the same organization that certifies restaurants that sell organic foods in Kenya.

Other people argue that most of the Kenyan farmers do not have the resources to buy fertilizers and pesticides or engage in expensive agricultural processes involved in commercialized conventional farming. Hence any food from a Kenyan farmer that is served daily in our households is essentially organic in nature.

Crops like millet, sorghum, groundnuts, beans, sweet potatoes, arrow roots, mangoes, carrots, and yam, among many others, are grown, processed, and preserved by many farmers without using fertilizers or pesticides.