Background Information
Background Information
Urban Kenya is unequal and the expanding urban population is being absorbed in slums or informal settlements with squalid living conditions, poor infrastructure and high poverty rates.
Rapid urbanization, poor management and absence of planning has left Kenya’s urban areas with huge backlogs in critical infrastructure and basic services. This has led to the emergence of sprawling, overcrowded and impoverished informal settlements. It is widely acknowledged that a significant proportion of urban residents live in these under-served informal settlements.
Acknowledging the need to directly tackle the problem of poor living conditions in slums, the government started working on a national slum-upgrading program in 2005 - the Kenya National Slum Upgrading Program (KENSUP). This included participatory planning and development, strengthening of tenure security for residents, and provision of housing and infrastructure services.
In 2011, the Government of Kenya in cooperation with the World Bank, the Agence Française de Dèveloppment and the Swedish International Cooperation Agency, further rolled out the Kenya Informal Settlement Improvement Project (KISIP) alongside Kenya Municipal Program (KMP), approved in May 2010 and Nairobi Metropolitan Services Project (NAMSIP), approved 2012 to complement KENSUP. The key focus for KISIP is to improve the living conditions for residents of selected informal settlements. Further, it also supports the efforts of the State Department for Housing and Urban Development to increase the number of housing by providing tenure security and infrastructure services in informal settlements.
The Project Development Objective (PDO) was to improve living conditions in informal settlements in 15 selected urban centers in 14 selected counties in Kenya. This was achieved through investments in infrastructure and service delivery, enhancement of tenure security, urban and land institutions capacity building and planning for urban growth.
KISIP 2 is an Investment Project Financing (IPF) project valued at US$165million with US$ 150 million credit provided by the International Development Association (IDA). The Government of Kenya (GoK) will contribute counterpart funding of an equivalent of US$15 million. It is a five-year project which shall close in the year 2026. The Project Development Objective (PDO) The Project Development Objective (PDO) is “to improve access to basic services and land tenure security of residents in participating urban informal settlements and strengthen institutional capacity for slum upgrading in Kenya”.
PROJECT COMPONENTS
The Project will be implemented through four components;
Component 1: Integrated settlement upgrading. This component combines land tenure regularization and investments in infrastructure services. This component will be implemented under two sub-components;
i)Sub-component 1.1: Land tenure regularization: This sub-component aims to coordinate and facilitate the conferment/ formalization of secure land tenure for selected informal settlements. This will be achieved through planning, land surveying, preparation and issuance of leases/ titles. This set of activities will be undertaken in uncontested public lands.
ii)Sub-component 1.2: Infrastructure Upgrading: This sub-component will coordinate investment in services and infrastructure construction in selected settlements/ counties. The investment portfolio menu includes; roads, bicycle paths, pedestrian walkways, street and security lighting, vending platforms, solid waste collection and sorting, storm water drainage, water and sanitation systems, public parks and green spaces as well as investment related to crime and violence including but not limited to community centers.
Component 2: Socio-economic inclusion planning: This component aims at identifying the socio-economic needs of the communities in the selected settlements (settlements under sub-component 1.2 – infrastructure upgrading). Its overall objective is to help in reducing poverty by linking poor and vulnerable people to the existing World Bank and GoK safety net programs and available job/income generating opportunities. It will also help at risk youth improve their skills and find access to jobs or start businesses. The main activities will include preparation of settlement level community development plans, support Labor-Intensive Community Works (LICW) including Digital Public Works (DPW), operationalization of the Solid Waste Management Strategy and Crime Prevention through Environmental Design (CPTED).
Component 3: Institutional capacity development for slum upgrading: This component aims to strengthen the capacity of counties and national government institutions to carry out slum upgrading and prevention. The main activities will include review and development of a national slum upgrading and prevention strategy, support in the development of county-specific slum upgrading and prevention policy and strategies, conduct capacity needs assessment including developing and implementing capacity building plans, develop financing mechanisms for slum upgrading at the County level and developing strategies to plan for urban growth; enhancing fiduciary and contract management across counties; undertake slum/informal settlements mapping and prepare a national slum geodatabase.
Component 4: Program management and coordination: This component supports project management at both national and county governments implementing agencies, i.e. National Project Coordination Team (NPCT) and County Project Coordination Teams (CPCT) including fiduciary (Financial management and procurement), environmental and social safeguards compliance, monitoring and evaluation, communication and community development.
KISIP 2 is being implemented in thirty-three (33) counties.
