There is good news in our mar­kets this week, and we should enjoy it before ask­ing where it came from. Maize is still afford­able, much of it from Zam­bia and Tan­za­nia. Buy it, cook it, and give thanks. Then walk with me to the cal­en­dar, because good news like this has a short season.

While we went about our week, cli­mate sci­en­tists from across South­ern Africa met in Swakop­mund, Namib­ia, and pub­lished a fore­cast on 28 August. After read­ing it, I real­ized it should have stopped every Kenyan news­room. Most of that region will prob­a­bly receive below-nor­mal rain this sea­son, and they said so with high con­fi­dence for Zam­bia, Zim­bab­we, Botswana, Namib­ia, and much of South Africa. Put plain­ly, the gra­nary we have been lean­ing on is expect­ed to fail.

Now hold that against what is com­ing to us, because the El Niño dry­ing our neigh­bors is expect­ed to soak us. The World Mete­o­ro­log­i­cal Orga­ni­za­tion con­firmed on Sep­tem­ber 3 that it is estab­lished and strength­en­ing. Our Mete­o­ro­log­i­cal Depart­ment expects above-nor­mal rain over most of Kenya start­ing in Octo­ber, and the Indi­an Ocean leans the same way. The World Food Pro­gram warns it will push 49 mil­lion more peo­ple into acute hunger.

So one sys­tem is hand­ing us a threat and an oppor­tu­ni­ty at once, both due with­in eight weeks.

Begin with the water. When the long rains came in March, reports said they killed 112 peo­ple across 30 coun­ties. Our towns did not flood because the rain turned cru­el. They flood­ed because we built on wet­lands, buried our streams, and left old drains packed with waste. A flood is not too much water. It is water we have left with nowhere to go.

Which brings us to the uncom­fort­able part. Flood­wa­ter is an hon­est audi­tor that finds every short­cut ever tak­en and reads them back to us in pub­lic. The wet­land some­one sold qui­et­ly will announce itself loud­ly in Novem­ber, and the drain a devel­op­er cov­ered will emp­ty into a class­room. Those who placed mon­ey ahead of doing right have not escaped the reck­on­ing; they have only moved it to a wet­ter month.

Every busi­ness should be awake because your ware­house, your staff, and your routes sit on that same ground. Urgent­ly clear the chan­nel behind your premis­es before any­one asks, and look close­ly at grain, which is nev­er cheap­er than in the sea­son before a short­age. On August 11, our Agri­cul­ture Cab­i­net Sec­re­tary warned of a 5.4 mil­lion-bag short­fall by the end of Sep­tem­ber, with imports cov­er­ing less than a fifth of it, while Zam­bia holds 2.49 mil­lion tones for sale. By mid-next year, it may be buy­ing instead.

Millers and traders should be con­tract­ing now; the Trea­sury and the Cere­als Board should be stor­ing now; and the Min­istry of Agri­cul­ture must facil­i­tate cer­ti­fied seed in every agrovet before the first storm, because the rain that threat­ens our streets will feed our farms. Kenya can enter 2027 as this region’s sup­pli­er or its supplicant.

My four decades among farm­ers taught me that you can­not dig a well on the day you are thirsty. The Food and Agri­cul­ture Orga­ni­za­tion said the same in an appeal that includes Kenya: ear­ly action is more effec­tive and less cost­ly than respond­ing after a cri­sis has esca­lat­ed. That is not sen­ti­ment but arith­metic, because every shilling spent on a cul­vert in Sep­tem­ber saves many spent on a funer­al in Decem­ber. Let Par­lia­ment con­vene on it, let coun­ty assem­blies release the mon­ey this month, and let every MCA name the blocked cul­vert they already know about in their ward.

In Novem­ber, a moth­er will stand in the same mar­ket where maize is cheap today, and what she pays and whether she gets home dry will be decid­ed now by peo­ple who are not think­ing about her. Let us be the gen­er­a­tion that moved while the sky was clear. Think Green, Act Green.