Kenya
We work with the poorest people in Kenya: pastoralists living on a knife-edge, refugees from war-torn Somalia and children with slim life chances. We work across a range of programme areas – from refugees to emergencies to an innovative livelihoods project. But we have one overriding aim: to help Kenya dramatically cut the number of infant, child and maternal deaths.
East Africa Appeal
We urgently need your help right now to save children's lives in the current drought. Find out more on our East Africa Appeal page
When you’re in Nairobi, with its green leafy suburbs and shopping malls, it feels like America.
When you’re in North East Province, where we work, you’re a world away. It’s as tough as anywhere in the world.
Catherine Fitzgibbon, programme quality director, Save the Children Kenya
- Failed rains have left East Africa in the grip of a food crisis, with millions of children at risk of starvation. 35% of under-fives in Kenya are stunted.
- We run Save the Children’s largest child protection programme in Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya — home to 280,000 people.
- In 2010 we surpassed our targets, treating more than 20,000 acutely malnourished children, providing supplementary feeding to another 419,000 and training hundreds of health workers to identify, treat, and prevent malnutrition.
The challenges
One of Africa’s most developed countries, Kenya is also one of the most unequal.
The places where we work — the drought-stricken and abandoned North East Province, the enormous Dadaab refugee camps and some of the country’s poorest communities — present huge challenges.
The greatest of these is tackling child and maternal deaths. While Kenya has made significant strides, the figures are still shocking:
- 74 children of every 1,000 born in Kenya will die before their fifth birthday.
- 70% of child deaths occur within the first year of life — 42% in the first month.
- Kenya is also home to one of the world’s largest refugee camps, Dadaab, housing 280,000 Somali refugees.
In the North East Province, loss of land and drought in a harsh, unforgiving climate strips families of their livestock and creates an ongoing emergency.
“If the drought continues like this, I fear the death of members of my family,” said Abdullahi, a 14-year-old boy who saw his family’s livestock die in the 2009 drought, leaving them with nothing.
In 2011, failed rains resulted in severe drought across much of country.