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Sharon Ikimat in Turkana, one of the regions of Kenya worst affected by climate change.
Kenya is very badly affected by climate change and regularly experiences droughts and flash floods. Nearly half of all Kenyans, approximately 21 million people, live below the poverty line. People regularly lack the basics we take for granted such as clean water, food and medicine. This is over four times the population of the whole of Ireland for whom a shortage of food can be an everyday reality.
Thanks to your support, Trócaire’s work in Kenya helps communities and families so that they do not go hungry. We also support women and adolescent girls who are survivors of violence. We help to prevent more violence against their friends, sisters, cousins and mothers. We promote human rights, democracy and peace in all of our work. We also help communities prepare for and respond to natural disasters.
KenyaHuman Development Index:
147th out of 189 countries
Life expectancy:
66 years
Gross National Income:
$3,089 per person
Kenya is among the poorest 25% of countries in the world. Nearly half of Kenyans continue to live below the national poverty line.
Despite achieving lower middle income status in 2014 from the World Bank, poverty and inequality remain high in Kenya.
A research report in March 2020 suggests that poverty levels are on the rise again. It is estimated that a group of 8,300 ‘super-rich’ (out of a population of 47.6 million) control almost two thirds of the entire Kenyan economy. Meanwhile millions of ordinary people are reliant on subsistence farming to feed themselves.
Corruption is deeply embedded within Kenyan society. In 2015, the Chief Justice of Kenya declared that the country is a “bandit economy”, controlled by mafia-style cartels. Governance remains weak, and decades of civic and political struggle preceded the passing of the Constitution of Kenya on 27th August 2010.
The 2010 constitution was expected to guarantee human rights to all, freedom from discrimination and change the governance system for the better. Ten years on there are serious implementation gaps and key obstacles blocking the protection and promotion of human rights for all.
A changing climate is hitting Kenya hard. The failure of two seasons of rains put between one and two million people in need of assistance over the dry summer months of 2019. 80% of the country is either arid or semi-arid. In these regions over 60% of people live on less than $1 a day.
Women in Kenya do the vast majority of agricultural work. Yet they earn only a fraction of the income generated. Only 29% of those earning a formal wage in the country are women.
Beliefs, norms and social institutions legitimise violence against women and girls. 39% of women have reported physical or sexual abuse by their husbands or partners.
Trócaire has been working in partnership with local organisations in Kenya for over 47 years and has built up very strong, deep and positive connections with communities and partners during that time. We established our Nairobi office in 1994.
Trócaire currently works with over 20 local partner organisations across all levels of Kenyan society. Our work continues to address not only the symptoms of poverty and marginalisation but also the underlying causes of such poverty.
| Title | Resource Type | Year | ||
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Trocaire Capacity Statement – Responding to Covid 19 |
Policy and Programmes | 14 Aug 2020 | Download |
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Partnership in Practice |
Policy and Programmes | 14 Aug 2020 | Download |
In Embu county, in Eastern Kenya, the rains didn’t come this year as expected. Nancy Muthoni is struggling to provide ...
“Mukuru is one of the biggest slums in Kenya, where hundreds of thousands of people live,” explained Sr Ursula Agge ...
“Everyone has problems but widows and orphans suffer most” says Elizabeth Arot, as she sits at a small wooden shack ...
In the midst of recovering from a deadly drought that took hold of the area for the last year, Pauline’s beautiful hom...
Nancy Wanjiku is a single mother with two daughters living in the Kangemi slum in Kenya. After being made redundant from...
John Gitonga Kamaindi, 54, is a farmer and a father of four. Known as ‘Masiga’ to his friends, nicknamed after a 198...
Drop-out rates for girls in secondary schools in Kenya are very high. There are many factors involved; some girls drop o...
I was in Kenya earlier this month when the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued their damning repo...
The workshop theme was “Resource-use and Management : Agroecology on-farm and wider-than-farm”. The particip...
Kenyans have survived through two years of failed rains. It is the worst crisis the country has faced since 2011. Thankf...
Risper is a 23-year old woman who lives in Nakuru, Kenya with her husband and two young sons, aged 6 and 3. Risper’s h...
Catherine lives in a small compound which sits high on the side of a sparse hill in an outlying rural area above a town ...
Trócaire is responding and will be providing food, water and other aid to 12,000 people over the coming weeks. Th...
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A motorcycle taxi driver describes how he is often the first to be called to scenes of domestic and sexual violence in h...
Minister Moran was in Kenya to promote Ireland as part of the Government’s St. Patrick’s programme. However, he took...
Carl Frampton has said that the “heartbreaking” poverty he witnessed during a trip to Kenya with Trócaire w...
It is not very often that I feel a sense of disillusionment after spending time with communities that Trócaire is worki...
Journalist Bill Corcoran takes a look at Trócaire’s peace-building initiatives in Kenya’s hotspots of intertri...
Reporter Chai Brady of The Irish Catholic newspaper travelled to Kenya earlier this summer with Trócaire. There, h...
Interview with Tony Woods from Doon in County Limerick who has lived and worked in Kenya for 50 years. Tony is currently...
Trócaire’s Niamh McCarthy reports on her recent visit to Turkana in Kenya, where she saw the awful impact of the ongo...
Drought is devastating northern Kenya and parts of neighbouring East African countries. And yet this situation isn’t m...
With severe drought gripping many parts of East Africa, millions of people are facing possible starvation in the coming ...
Prolonged drought is causing a widespread hunger crisis across East African countries. Somalia, South Sudan and parts...
Extreme food shortages are occurring across a number of African countries, with large areas of East Africa worst affecte...
Today on International Human Rights Day 2016, I feel privileged that I get to defend human rights and support the fight ...
Photo caption: Mwasuma Beekeepers; Tabitha Komu, Dorcus Kenyatta and Nzomo Musyoka from Kitui, Kenya. Dorcas Kenyatta (p...
Climate change is leading to significant migration in Kenya, dividing loved-ones and driving families apart. Meet Teresi...
Trócaire’s Michelle Hoctor writes about Father Patrick Devine, a Trócaire partner working on conflict issue...
“Climate change threatens to undo all the gains that have been made against poverty”, according to Trócaire...
By James Mwangi, Governance and Human Rights Officer in Kenya, and Julian Waagensen, Governance and Human Rights Policy ...
By Catherine Khamali, Kenya HIV Officer Trócaire is supporting a health clinic assisting the HIV positive community in ...
By Lawrence W. Mwagwabi, Kenya Governance and Human Rights Programme Officer, 28 February 2013 On March 4th, Kenyans wil...
Caption: Trócaire has used Irish donations to fund vital agriculture programmes in regions such as Ishiara in Kenya. Ph...
Andrew Lodio has nowhere to go. Drought has ravaged his land, bringing dry desert all around him. A sea of dust stretche...
In a sea of famine and hunger, a small patch of land in the village of Nakwalekwi, northern Kenya, acts as a beacon of h...
We met Elella (pictured below) in the town of Lokitaung, around 50km ...
The Turkana district of northern Kenya is where human life began. The earliest known human remains have been found ...
