Acting Now for Food Security and Resilient Food Systems: Kenya Baseline Report
In Makueni, Kwale and Taita Taveta, only 32% of treatment households had enough food all year. Nearly half of crop responses reported lower income and yields than the year before, mainly because of drought.
Overview
Solidaridad's PMEL team carried out this internal baseline in July 2023 for the Acting Now programme (2023-2025), which works with 70,000 smallholder farmers, with a focus on women and youth, in drought-affected Makueni, Kwale and Taita Taveta counties. The programme aims to increase production and local availability of nutritious food and to build resilience. The baseline sets starting values for the programme KPIs: food sufficiency, income, yield, access to services, training and service-provider support. Treatment farmers (70% of the sample) are compared with control farmers in neighbouring areas of the same counties (30%).
Key findings
- The average MAHFP was 7.19 months across 851 farmers (median 8). 32% of treatment and 42% of control households had enough food in all 12 months, while 26% and 16% had a MAHFP score of 0.
- On the household hunger scale, 64% of farmers faced little to no hunger, 35% moderate hunger and 1% severe hunger.
- Of crop responses, 47% reported lower farm income than the year before, 40% no change and 13% an increase. 49% reported lower yields, including 63% of maize farmers in the treatment group, mainly because of drought, pests and diseases, and lack of inputs.
- Only 20% of farmers had received a service from a service provider in the past year (treatment 20%, control 21%). 84.1% of treatment and 74.9% of control farmers were not members of a producer organisation.
- About 95% of farmers had access to a mobile phone, and 40.1% (treatment) and 44.9% (control) had mobile internet. 19% (treatment) and 7% (control) could not read and write, with three times as many women as men unable to.
- Average cultivated land was 2.85 acres (treatment) and 2.37 acres (control). Maize was the main crop for 71.7% of treatment and 65% of control farmers.
- Mean annual production costs were KES 15,302 per farmer (median KES 11,500). Labour and seeds were the most commonly reported cost items.
In figures
32 % of households
42 % of households
Data table
| Item | % of households |
|---|---|
| Project households | 32 |
| Comparison households | 42 |
47 % of crop responses
40 % of crop responses
13 % of crop responses
Data table
| Item | % of crop responses |
|---|---|
| Lower farm income | 47 |
| No change | 40 |
| Higher farm income | 13 |
Methodology
Mixed-methods baseline: a structured household survey of 851 farmers (70% treatment, 30% control in neighbouring areas) and 47 service providers across three counties, selected randomly and purposively with county agricultural offices, plus key informant interviews with county extension officers and a desk review. Data were collected on Kobo and analysed in R.
Limitations
- Farmers were spread out and hard to reach, which made it difficult to collect data from comparison/control groups.
- Data collection had to be done quickly in a short period, which may have affected data quality and submission in some cases.