The new Dongo Kundu Dual carriageway in Mombasa
Over the years, there has been increasing public investment in transport infrastructure in Kenya both through direct budgetary allocations and private sector partnerships. For instance, in 2018, US$ 2.1 billion (representing almost 10 per cent of the entire 2018/19 annual budget) was allocated to transport infrastructure where over 50 per cent of it was availed for road projects. This was a 100 per cent increase from the previous year.
For these investments, Kenya’s road network has expanded from 160,886 kilometres in 2007 to 227,893.2 kilometres in 2018. During that time, there has been an increase in good roads from 11% to 62% across the country (Ngoo, 2015).
The Government through the Kenya Roads Board asserts that infrastructure improvement aims to spur national economic growth and that better roads will contribute to poverty reduction by lowering the costs of goods and services, improving access to social facilities and administration centres and improving safety and security. Kenya’s current strategic investment in the road sector is aligned to the Big 4 initiative as instrumental to attaining economic development goals by 2030.
Blog by Justus B. Aungo, PhD. Read more on the Research and Innovation Blog https://uonresearch.org/
