Kenyan economy through the eyes of the World Bank, are we growing?

It is rare to find a report on the Kenyan economy distilled off politics and emotions. The World Bank report on Kenya, “From Economic Growth to Jobs and Shared Prosperity” tried to do that. The 128 pages is an easy read, with minimal esoteric equations and graphs. It was officially launched on March 8. The report notes lack of current data on our economy. Innovations like night lights approach is helping close this gap on data. Lights at night can be a proxy measure of economic activities and satellite images can easily capture that.

Apurva Sanghi, the World Bank Lead Economist & Programme Leader for Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda and Eritrea notes that the main objective of the report is to start a public debate and discussion on Kenya’s growth model. He says the previous growth model may have worked in the past but it is time to recognise some of the current and future economic realities to re-design this growth model.