NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Tuesday, February 26, 2019

By Njenga Hakeenah

Women are helping to run Kenya’s economy by controlling half the 1.3 million MSMEs in the East African investment hub.

According to the Kenya Bureau of Statistics, Kenya’s women contribute to 46.5 per cent of the labour force in a country where the poverty rate is at 34.8 per cent.

Kenya is ranked 14th overall in Africa on the African Development Bank’s AfDB 2015 Gender Equality Index (AfDB, 2015).

The country scored 0.719 out if the highest possible score of 1 at the Global Gender Gap Index 2015 of the World Economic Forum. Kenya was at position 48 out of 145 countries.

Photo courtesy of hodag.