The government has urged the international community, donor groups and development partners to increase their purchase of relief food for refugees from local farmers.
Speaking on Tuesday during a forum to mark World Refugee Day in Nairobi, the Prime Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi said this will be an important step in supporting host communities.
He regretted that Kenyan farmers have been neglected while supporting the refugees and are struggling to sell their produce.
“One of the biggest debates we have had in Kenya for quite some time is that when supporting the refugees, the Kenyan farmer has been neglected. We sometimes always grapple about the price of maize, wheat and what it takes,” Mudavadi said.
“It is sometimes tragic when we see that the farmer in Kenya is struggling to sell his/her maize but we are steadily importing all the grain to feed these refugee camps from elsewhere so the support goes to another farmer but it does not come to the host farmer.”
Mudavadi insisted that as the donors reorganise, they should ensure that within their framework, the Kenyan farmer is included.
Currently, Kenya is the 13th largest refugee-hosting nation in the world and fifth in Africa.
According to Mudavadi, some 612, 413 registered refugees and asylum seekers are hosted in Kenya, out of which, 84 per cent are residents in the camps while the balance is in urban areas.
Somalia, South Sudan and the DRC are the top three sources of Kenya’s refugee population with 56 per cent, 30 per cent and 7 per cent respectively.
There are also 94,417 refugees mainly in our major towns of Nairobi, Mombasa, Nakuru and Eldoret among others.
Mudavadi said Kenya is managing refugees through an encampment policy where refugees reside in two camps namely Kakuma and Dadaab.
He, however, stated that the care and maintenance approach has not supported effective leverage of the social-economic potential of the refugees.
He affirmed that the government is keen to create an enabling environment that supports the socio-economic inclusion of refugees and the collective efforts to build the resilience of host communities.
“The administration is fully aware of the need to give full focus and attention to sustainable refugee management. Soon, the regulations to operationalize the Refugee Act 2021 will be tabled in Parliament for necessary approval and enactment,” Mudavadi said.
“It is important to recognise the global shift in refugee management. Host countries are increasingly turning into settlements for refugees. This approach has two aims: to reduce reliance on humanitarian help from host governments and other humanitarian agencies, and to make refugees self-reliant and important players in the growth of host countries’ economy.”
Mudavadi said Kenya cannot be an exception to this trend, even as he reiterated the Government’s to transform refugee camps into integrated settlements.