Kenya is a strategic partner and ally of the United States in promoting peace and security throughout East Africa. In 2020, the two countries celebrated 57 years of diplomatic ties that facilitate strong economic, development, and security cooperation. The U.S. government supports Kenya’s growth and prosperity in three important ways: (1) bilateral assistance, (2) multilateral assistance, and (3) creating a favorable policy environment to facilitate trade, immigration, and investment.
Taken together, we estimate that U.S. government-driven assistance contributes approximately USD 1.68 billion annually to the Kenyan economy. This includes USD 1 billion in direct bilateral and multilateral assistance per year on average, as well as USD 678 million in indirect contributions from supportive policies. In the remainder of this chapter, we examine each of these three channels in turn to understand how they generate value for the Kenyan people.
Official development assistance (ODA)—including grants, concessional lending, and technical advice—is an important channel of U.S. government support to Kenya’s growth and prosperity. The United States has historically been Kenya’s single largest development partner in terms of gross bilateral ODA flows (OECD-DAC, n.d.). In addition, the U.S. government has been a leading supporter of multilateral organizations (e.g., UN agencies, development banks) and multi-donor funds operating in Kenya. In this section, we examine how U.S. bilateral and multilateral assistance work together to help the Kenyan people achieve their goals outlined in Vision 2030.
Twenty U.S. government agencies and departments have directly contributed to Kenya’s growth and development since 2001.[4] Among these, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) spearheads U.S. bilateral efforts in critical areas such as: agriculture and food security, education, health, making devolved governance work for all, peace building, environment, and sustained economic growth (USAID Kenya, n.d.).
Between 2001 and 2018, the U.S. government increased its annual bilateral assistance to Kenya tenfold, from USD 106 million to 986.54 million (see Figure 1).[5] Over the last five years,[6] the United States has contributed on average USD 931 million in bilateral assistance per year.
Notes: This graph visualizes total U.S. government bilateral assistance disbursements to Kenya each year from 2001 to 2018 in constant USD 2019. These figures include both development assistance and security aid directly given via U.S. government agencies. They exclude assistance given by the U.S. via multilateral agencies that may also benefit Kenya.
Source: USAID Foreign Aid Explorer Data (2001-2018).
Sixty-two percent of U.S. bilateral assistance to Kenya between 2010 and 2018 was focused in the health sector (see Figure 2). This assistance complements and extends the Kenyan government’s efforts to deliver affordable healthcare for all. For example, in 2017, total U.S. government bilateral assistance to the health sector was USD 598.7 million, topping up the roughly USD 367.5 million that Kenya mobilized domestically to meet its healthcare needs (National Treasury, 2017).
Notes: This graph visualizes the sector breakdown of total U.S. government bilateral assistance disbursements to Kenya from 2010 to 2018, in constant 2019 USD.
Source: USAID Foreign Aid Explorer Data (2010-2018).
The U.S. government targets a large proportion of its health sector assistance towards helping Kenya combat its HIV/AIDS epidemic. In fact, the United States is the single largest funder of HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment programs in the country (see Box 1). In addition, the United States has also ramped up funding since 2008 (see Figure 3) to help Kenya address other priority health concerns, such as: tuberculosis, malaria, family planning and reproductive health, maternal and child health, and emerging pandemic threats.
Notes: This graph visualizes the sub-sector breakdown of total U.S. government bilateral assistance disbursements in health to Kenya from 2001 to 2018, in constant 2019 USD.
Source: USAID Foreign Aid Explorer Data (2001-2018).
In addition to supporting Kenya’s longer-term development priorities in line with Vision 2030, the U.S. government marshaled emergency assistance to help the Kenyan people recover from shocks, such as channeling USD 95.6 million in food aid to over 4.4 million Kenyans affected by the 2011-2012 East African Drought (see Box 2). In Box 3, we also take a closer look at the estimated USD 85.8 million in U.S. bilateral assistance focused on investing in Kenya’s growing youth population between 2009 and 2018.
HIV/AIDS funding has been a critical part of U.S. bilateral support to Kenya following the 2003 launch of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). Today, however, the U.S. response has evolved to include a number of programs, such as the AIDS, Population, and Health Integrated Assistance (APHIAplus) program, which takes a holistic approach to health in combining family planning, maternal/child health, nutrition, and malaria and tuberculosis prevention to build a more comprehensive healthcare program alongside Kenyan health officials. With annual disbursements of over USD 400 million, the United States remains the largest single funder for HIV/AIDS programming in Kenya, well exceeding all other donors combined.
Notes: The chart visualizes the largest bilateral and multilateral donors to Kenya in terms of HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment spending between 2009-2018 in constant 2019 USD.
Source: OECD CRS Database (2009-2018).
Apart from funding public health programs in Kenya, the U.S. government’s Department of Defense also supports groundbreaking research on infectious diseases in Kenya. The Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI) has hosted the U.S. Army Medical Research Directorate (USAMRD) headquarters since 1969. Over the nearly five decades of its operation, the research lab based in Nairobi, as well as its field sites in Kisumu, Kisian, Kombewa and Kericho, have been at the forefront of biomedical research contributing to the development of major vaccines and medicines for treatment of diseases such as malaria, trypanosomiasis, leishmaniasis, HIV/AIDS, and arboviruses.
Between 2008 and 2018, the U.S. government delivered an estimated USD 1.2 billion (an average of USD 109 million per year) in assistance to combat hunger in Kenya under Title II of the U.S. Food for Peace Act. Initially, this assistance focused on the direct delivery of food produced by the United States to those at risk of hunger or starvation. While much of the United States’ food aid to Kenya coincided with the response to the East African Drought of 2011-2012, the United States still channeled an average of USD 70.5 million per year in Title II food aid to Kenya between 2014 and 2018. As the severity of the hunger emergency from the 2011-2012 drought subsided, U.S. assistance has pivoted from providing emergency food aid to longer-term food security focused on helping communities mitigate the risk of future emergencies through efforts to prevent malnutrition and support agricultural production.
Notes: This graph visualizes the annual disbursement value of U.S. Title II food aid to Kenya and the annual disbursement value of U.S. agricultural aid Kenya between 2008 and 2018, in constant 2019 USD.
Source: USAID - Food for Peace Funding Overview Fact Sheet (2008-2018) and USAID Foreign Aid Explorer Data (2001-2018).
With 75 percent of its population under the age of 35 (Baraza, 2020), investing in Kenya’s growing youth population is critical to realizing its aspiration to achieve middle-income status by 2030. To this end, the U.S. government mobilized an estimated USD 85.8 million in direct bilateral assistance for programs benefiting Kenyan youth between 2009 and 2018. Youth-focused economic empowerment accounts for the largest share of this assistance (37 percent), followed by programs providing shelter and livelihood skills training, among other types of support, for youth refugees (18 percent), and support to basic and higher education opportunities (14 percent).
U.S. government support to many youth-focused programs emphasizes the importance of public-private partnerships to invest in the next generation of leaders and workers. The Kenya Youth Employment and Skills (K-YES) program creates opportunities for public and private sector leaders to work together to solve the challenges of youth unemployment through customized job training programs that help young people fill critical skill gaps in target industries. The Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI), meanwhile, engages 40 U.S. universities to provide skills and support for Kenyan young people through its Mandela Washington Fellowship Program and the Regional Leadership Center for East Africa based in Nairobi.
Note: The total amount of direct U.S. bilateral assistance to youth-oriented projects was estimated through applying a filter to identify activities that explicitly reference youth or adolescents in the project title. This could be an underestimate of the total value of U.S. assistance dollars that benefit Kenya’s youth population. All disbursement numbers are in constant 2019 USD. Source: Foreign Aid Explorer (2009-2018).