Kenya - Poverty and Inequality Assessment : Executive Summary and Synthesis Report

This assessment of poverty and
inequality comes at an important juncture for Kenya. The
December 2007 elections and subsequent pronouncements of the
newly formed Grand Coalition have underlined the salience of
these issues to ordinary Kenyans, and for policy makers. The
violence in early 2008 highlighted the importance of
addressing poverty and inequality as major goals in their
own right, but also for instrumental reasons, as major goals
in their own right, the persistent inequalities spark
conflict, which is welfare reducing, and this conflict in
turn will harm prospects for growth. The onset of the global
credit crunch has also shown how poverty and public service
delivery related vulnerabilities could be exacerbated by
external shocks. Cumulatively, these factors underline the
value of appropriate diagnostics about the patterns of
poverty and inequality in informing public debates,
strategies and actions to overcome exclusion from the
benefits of growth and development in Kenya as well as
designing policies to minimize the impact of the current
global crisis.