Outcome RD_D_1.3

Outcome 3 By 2026, people in Kenya at risk of being left behind - particularly all women and girls, all children and youth, all people in the ASAL counties and in informal urban settlements - derive benefit from inclusive, sustainable, diversified and environmentally/climate-sensitive quality livelihoods with decent work in the sector economies and realise growth that is resilient, green, and equitable.

In 2024, UN Women contributed to promoting gender-responsive climate action while building resilience and improving livelihoods for women, girls, and communities. This led to increased gender-responsive budget (GRB) allocation, income, food security and health, and reduced poverty. Building on efforts to achieve gender-responsive County Integrated Development Policies (CIDPs) in all 47 counties, UN Women contributed to increased Gender-Responsive Budgeting (GRB) in 3 counties. Laikipia: Agriculture and gender departments’ budget rose from USD 1,790,697 2023/2024) to USD 6,147,286 (2024/2025) (+243%). Kitui: CSA allocation increased from USD 409,302 to USD 740,342.40 (+64%), and the gender department from USD 46,368 to USD 101,236.80 (+118%). West Pokot: CSA allocation increased from USD 829,457 to USD 3,279,069 (+295%). (1). The increased budgetary allocations are attributed to extensive capacity building of county officials carried out on GRB, advocacy campaigns and awareness creation amongst farmer groups. The establishment of Gender and Climate-Smart Agriculture (CSA) units within county departments has also been key in spearheading increased budget allocations for gender-responsive and climate-smart agricultural initiatives. Through the “Kenya Economic Empowerment of Women through Climate-Smart Agriculture (WEE-CSA) in Arid and Semi-Arid Central Areas” project, households in Laikipia, Kitui and West Pokot increased their annual income by 36% between 2020 and 2024 - from USD 718 in 2020 to USD1,014. Notable, households with disabled members saw a 52% income increase, while those without saw a 33% rise. The proportion of households experiencing both severe and moderate diseases also declined from 83% to 65%, and the severe category from 66% to 42%. The same project also resulted in expansion of area under CSA practices (from 768 hectares in 2022 to 5,067.52 hectares in 2024), improving agricultural sustainability, resilience to climate change and improved agricultural productivity. UN Women contributed towards the achievement of these results by empowering female and male farmers by providing training, resources, and support for adopting climate-smart agricultural practices, as well as by strengthening productivity and resilience to climate change. UN Women also conducted capacity-building programs, such as financial literacy and entrepreneurship training, and facilitated access to markets. Through Village Savings and Loan Associations (VSLAs), women gained financial independence to invest in better farming techniques. Financial literacy helped transform the traditional merry-go-rounds into table banking or VSLAs, and women borrowed to invest in CSA and to meet short-term household expenditures. Finally, efforts to strengthen legal and institutional frameworks at national and county level were successful. UN Women together with partners managed to integrate women-focused and climate-smart interventions in agriculture and social-protection sectors. Critical was the development of the National Care Policy, second in Africa, which was developed and validated in close collaboration with government, CSOs and academia. The Policy is currently under review by the Attorney General. Once adopted, it will help reduce, redistribute and recognize unpaid care work, acknowledging its importance in the economy and society. Other key documents included the National Policy on Women Economic Empowerment, which will help create an enabling environment for women’s economic participation, address gender disparities and vulnerabilities and promote access to economic resources, and the Access to Government Procurement Opportunity Policy (AGPO). Counties were also building on the gender-responsive County Integrated Development Plans (CIDPs) to develop its Annual Development Plans and gender responsive budgets. For AGPO, the county governments performed well in AGPO reporting with an average score of 26.8% out of 36% and in procurement planning with an average score of 13.33% out of 28%. UN Women leveraged on its coordination mandate to bring stakeholders together, ensured linkages with normative frameworks such as CEDAW, provided technical inputs and financial support. Efforts to ensure women's economic empowerment in Kenya will continue with increased force and focus in 2025.

Outcome 3 By 2026, people in Kenya at risk of being left behind - particularly all women and girls, all children and youth, all people in the ASAL counties and in informal urban settlements - derive benefit from inclusive, sustainable, diversified and environmentally/climate-sensitive quality livelihoods with decent work in the sector economies and realise growth that is resilient, green, and equitable.

There was in 2023 progress towards ensuring that all people in Kenya, particularly women and girls, benefit from inclusive, sustainable, diversified and environmentally/climate-sensitive quality livelihoods. All 47 counties developed and adopted County Integrated development Policies (CIDPs) III, which for the first time were gender responsive. UN Women supported Laikipia, West Pokot and Kitui counties in the development of CIDPs III and Annual Development plans (ADP), as well as Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA) policies, which aim to improve rural women farmers’ livelihoods and food security. The plans integrated women-focused and climate-smart interventions in agriculture and social-protection sectors, with budget allocations of KES 52.8 million (USD 344,000) in Kitui county, KES 276 million (USD 1.8 million) in Laikipia and USD 23 million (KES 3.6 billion) and USD 9 million (KES 1.4 billion) for agriculture and gender sectors in West Pokot. To achieve the result, UN Women, with partners Anglican Development Services Eastern, Hand in Hand Eastern Africa and Village Enterprise, conducted sensitization campaigns, advocacy efforts, and built the capacity of county government staff. UN Women also empowered rural women to engage in planning processes and advocate for gender-responsive CSA inclusion. In terms of increased productivity and household-level income, nutrition, and food security for rural farmers there were also great results achieved in 2023. In Kitui, Laikipia and West Pokot 866 rural farmers (F:734, M:132) from 57 beneficiary farmer groups aggregated along 17 enterprises increased their income from USD 17,640 in 2022 to USD 202,174. Women who accessed group credits also increased their savings from USD 55,294 to USD 89,685. This was achieved by UN Women in partnership with FAO by strengthening existing aggregation mechanisms. In addition, capacity-building efforts of 2,665 farmers (2,280 F, 385 M, 666 Y, 232 PWDs) on how to apply climate-smart agriculture (CSA) technologies and practices in their agricultural production activities were carried out and small grants (USD 134,466) to 48 farmer groups were distributed. The rural farmers adopted gender-responsive CSA technologies, including vertical and sunken kitchen gardens, along with the utilization of locally improved multi-functional brooders for indigenous chicken farming and CSA practices such as kitchen gardening, conservation agriculture and fodder and pasture production, on 1,598 hectares of farmland (714 hectares in 2022). The beneficiary farmer groups influenced community development by organising and leading community activities e.g., tree planting, soil conservation and construction of water harvesting structures that contribute to climate change mitigation and adaptation. Monitoring missions revealed that some non-beneficiaries have adopted CSA practices as a result of the influence of the beneficiaries, and observations show significant difference in crop health of beneficiaries who have adopted CSA technologies vis-a-vis non-beneficiaries that have not adopted them. Beyond financial support, UN Women contributed to achieving these results by strengthening strategic partnerships with key stakeholders, such as the UN, national and county governments, CSOs, and the private sector. UN Women, in coordination with the Council of Governors and National Treasury, actively enhanced awareness and knowledge among women entrepreneurs by simplifying and disseminating the Bidders Handbook, providing AGPO training, and guiding participants on legal frameworks, table banking, and bid-winning strategies with a specific focus on promoting gender-responsive businesses. The achievements highlighted above underscore its overall alignment with UN Women's efforts in Kenya, particularly in the context of the ToC, with a focus on women's economic empowerment. Key lessons learned: - Establishing robust market linkages is crucial for women to make informed decisions regarding production of value chains and fostering engagement of women in agricultural income-generation activities. - Under AGPO, efforts need to address the issue of underquoting by women, PWDs, and youth through advocacy for improvements in the bid-winning process. UN Women will continue its efforts to address issues through partnerships with county governments, private sector and CSOs, monitor progress and incorporate lessons learned in ongoing women's economic empowerment programs.

Outcome 3 By 2026, people in Kenya at risk of being left behind - particularly all women and girls, all children and youth, all people in the ASAL counties and in informal urban settlements - derive benefit from inclusive, sustainable, diversified and environmentally/climate-sensitive quality livelihoods with decent work in the sector economies and realise growth that is resilient, green, and equitable.

In 2025, Kenya made significant progress towards strengthening women economic empowerment through gender responsive national policies, and expanded access to markets and decent work opportunities, women, girls and persons with disabilities increasingly benefited from economic pathways that support resilience, sustainability and equity. These results reflect concrete movement toward diversified sector economies that integrate gender equality and climate responsiveness as core development priorities. Strengthening Gender Responsive Economic and Climate Governance A major achievement was the advancement and adoption of 4 national and multisectoral strategies and policies that embed gender equality across Kenya’s economic and climate architecture. The National Gender and Climate Change Action Plan integrated gender equality as a core objective across climate governance, ensuring that women’s leadership, differentiated climate vulnerabilities, and livelihood resilience in ASAL counties are addressed within adaptation and mitigation priorities. This represents a strategic shift toward climate sensitive livelihood planning that responds to exclusion and environmental risk simultaneously. Parallel progress was achieved through the Disability Inclusion Strategy, which embeds gender equality across economic empowerment, access to services, political participation, data and digital transformation. By addressing intersecting discrimination faced by women and girls with disabilities, including exposure to gender based violence and exclusion from labour markets, the Strategy strengthens pathways to decent work, inclusive employment and care governance, particularly for women caregivers and women with disabilities. Transforming the Care Economy to Enable Women’s Economic Participation The National Care Policy, approved by Cabinet in December 2025, marked a transformative milestone by recognizing unpaid care and domestic work as a structural gender equality and economic issue. By establishing a national framework to recognize, reduce and redistribute unpaid care work, the Policy directly addresses a key constraint limiting women’s participation in productive livelihoods and decent work. The Policy provides a foundation for care responsive investments and institutional accountability that enable women across rural, urban and ASAL contexts to engage more fully in climate resilient and green economic sectors. Advancing Women’s Economic Empowerment and Decent Work In March 2025, Cabinet approval of the National Policy on Women’s Economic Empowerment established Kenya’s first government wide framework to address structural barriers to women’s economic participation. The Policy advances inclusive growth by strengthening women’s access to financial services, markets, entrepreneurship opportunities and decent work across sectors. Together with the Care Policy, it reinforces a coherent national approach to gender responsive economic transformation and resilient livelihoods. Expanding Women’s Access to Markets and Procurement Tangible progress was recorded in expanding women’s access to procurement markets as a pathway to sustainable livelihoods. Contracts awarded to women owned and women led enterprises increased from 18,733 in 2023 to 2024 to 20,799 in 2024 to 2025, while the value of contracts rose from USD 231 million to USD 256 million. Overall awards under the Access to Government Procurement Opportunities framework increased from USD 393.24 million to USD 436.25 million, signalling increasingly inclusive public procurement systems at national and county levels. To strengthen the pipeline of women ready to participate in high value markets, 539 women owned and women led enterprises across ten counties, including ASAL counties such as Turkana, Samburu, Isiolo and West Pokot, were supported to strengthen procurement readiness, business formalization, financial literacy and market access. These enterprises are now better positioned to compete for public and private sector opportunities, enhancing decent work, income security and resilience to climate and economic shocks. Relevance of the Theory of Change The results achieved during the reporting period confirm that the Theory of Change underpinning this outcome remains valid. Evidence demonstrates that when gender responsive policies, inclusive economic governance, care systems reform and targeted support to women entrepreneurs are advanced together, they reinforce one another to expand access to decent work, diversify livelihoods and strengthen resilience. The convergence of policy reform, market access and enterprise capacity validates the assumption that sustainable and equitable growth for those most at risk of being left behind requires coordinated structural and market level interventions. Contribution of UN Women UN Women contributed to these results through sustained technical leadership, including drafting, technical review and application of gender analysis across national strategies and policies. UN Women supported responsible government institutions to integrate global gender equality standards and evidence into economic and climate frameworks, results architectures and accountability mechanisms, while strengthening coherence across multisectoral actors. In parallel, UN Women supported women owned and women led enterprises to access procurement markets and build resilience through targeted capacity strengthening. Through this contribution, UN Women helped translate global commitments into nationally owned, gender responsive systems that advance inclusive, sustainable and climate sensitive livelihoods for women and girls in Kenya.