Transformation of Kenya’s agrifood system structure and drivers

Kenya experienced significant economic development in the 2009 to 2019 period. Gross domestic product (GDP)—an indicator of the economy’s size—expanded by an annual average of 5 percent (KNBS 2022). This exceeded population growth and helped raise household incomes, leading to a decline in poverty rates; more importantly, for the first time in at least three decades, the country experienced a decline in the absolute number of poor people (World Bank 2022). While the global COVID-19 pandemic caused negative economic growth in 2020, the economy recovered quickly in 2021. Kenya was also largely spared the adverse effects of the global commodity market disruptions arising from the Russia-Ukraine war that started in 2022 and from the global recession in 2023 (Arndt et al. 2023; Diao and Thurlow 2023). Kenya’s GDP growth is projected to reach 5.0 percent in 2023 and 5.3 percent in 2024 (World Bank 2023), suggesting that the economy is resuming its pre-pandemic growth trajectory. Agriculture remains an important sector, accounting for about one-quarter of GDP and nearly half of Kenya’s employment. It has thus played an important role in economic development. The sector has grown alongside the rest of the economy despite many challenges including climate variability (Ochieng et al. 2020), weak rural infrastructure (Benin and Odjo 2018), declines in farm size (Jayne et al. 2016), and limited access to farm inputs combined with poor agronomic management (Worku et al. 2020). In this brief, we look beyond primary agriculture to understand how Kenya’s broader agrifood system (AFS) is contributing to growth and transformation in the country.