EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 

According to Kenya’s Vision 2030 Development Strategy for Northern Kenya and Other Arid  Lands, approximately 89% of the country’s land area is arid and semi-arid (Republic of Kenya,  2012). These arid and semi-arid lands (ASALs) are home to more than 60% of the total livestock  in Kenya, and produce over 50% of the meat consumed countrywide (KNBS, 2010). They also  host about 38% of the country’s population and continue to experience a boom in population  as large numbers of people move to these areas in pursuit of emerging economic opportunities.  Kenya recently re-focused its development targets into four key areas that are critical not only for  economic growth, but also for social and environmental progress – dubbed the Big Four Agenda.  The Big Four Agenda are: affordable and decent housing; affordable healthcare; food and  nutrition security; and employment creation through manufacturing. This brief synthesizes insights  from the five-year multi-county research project ‘Pathways to Resilience in Semi-Arid Economies’  (PRISE) using climate change research in four counties of Kenya (Makueni, Narok, Kajiado and  Laikipia) and focusing on four thematic areas (beef value chain, private sector investment,  migration and land tenure management). The brief examines climate change impacts in ASALs,  and how these impacts threaten the realization of food and nutrition security and employment  creation through manufacturing in ASALs. It also discusses options to enhance the contribution of  the semi-arid economies to the realization of these two of the Big Four Agenda. 

Arid and semi-arid lands are climate change hotspots, where climate change is already having  significant and documented impacts, such as longer and more frequent droughts and unreliable  rainfall. This threatens the opportunities for realizing the Big Four Agenda objectives. Findings from  PRISE research indicate that there has been a general decline in rainfall in more than half of ASALs  counties of Kenya. Climatic projections based on all the three Representative Concentration  Pathways (RCPs) 2.6, 4.5 and 8.5 also show that, the short rainy season of October-November 

December will become more reliable compared to the main rainy season of March-April-May.  The decline in rainfall and changes in temperature, have led to a 26.5% decrease in the number  of livestock in the last few years. Evidence from PRISE research provides some options that could  enable climate compatible interventions under the Big Four Agenda…..

Contextualizing Pathways to Resilience in Kenya’s ASAL’s under the Big Four Agenda