Kenya’s population of chronically undernourished people more than doubled to over 20 million during nearly two decades in which the country promoted commercial seeds, synthetic fertiliser and input subsidies, according to a new report questioning the results of Africa’s Green Revolution model.
The report, The Green Revolution Has Failed Africa, says Kenya’s experience reflects a wider regional pattern where governments and donors increased support for fertiliser and improved seed, but staple-crop productivity did not accelerate and hunger continued to rise.
Published by the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA), the study examines data from 2006 to 2024 in 13 countries prioritised by AGRA, formerly the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa. They include Kenya, Ethiopia, Ghana, Malawi, Mali, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Burkina Faso and Niger.
Across those countries, fertiliser use more than doubled, while the weighted yield of staple crops grew by an average of 1.2 percent a year. That was slightly below the 1.3 percent annual growth recorded during the 12 years before AGRA was launched in 2006, the report says.
At the same time, cultivated land expanded by 46 percent, suggesting that much of the additional food production came from bringing more land under crops rather than producing substantially more from existing farmland. “This is expansion, not agricultural transformation,” the report says.
The findings challenge a central promise of the input-led approach, which argued that wider use of commercial seed and fertiliser would rapidly raise yields and farmer incomes, ultimately reducing hunger. AGRA initially pledged to double yields and incomes for 30 million smallholder households and halve food insecurity by 2020. The report says those targets were not achieved.
For Kenya, its most striking claim is that the number of undernourished people more than doubled to over 20 million. Across all 13 focus countries, the number rose by 58 percent, from 94.6 million to 149.6 million.
The report does not establish that fertiliser or AGRA’s activities caused the increase in hunger. Kenya’s population grew substantially over the period, while drought, the Covid-19 pandemic, high food and fuel prices, income inequality and disruptions in global grain and fertiliser markets also affected access to food. Hunger totals should therefore be considered alongside population-adjusted prevalence rates.
Nevertheless, the authors argue that the figures undermine the assumption that subsidised inputs and higher production automatically produce affordable food, improved diets or better household incomes.
Kenya has committed considerable public money to that model. Citing AGRA’s own policy studies, the report puts Kenyan fertiliser-subsidy spending at about US$72 million a year between 2017 and 2022, the highest figure cited among the countries reviewed. It also refers to commissioned research that found no significant effect on net crop income in Kenya.
These claims raise questions about value for money, who receives subsidised inputs and whether spending on fertiliser has displaced investment in extension, local seed systems, soil restoration, storage and markets.
The report is not an argument for abruptly withdrawing support from farmers, many of whom depend on subsidies to afford inputs. Instead, it calls for governments to redirect part of their existing subsidy budgets towards diversified agroecological farming, public extension and farmer-managed seed systems.
The environmental implications are also significant. Across the focus countries, the share of farmland planted with millet and sorghum fell from 26 percent to 16 percent as maize cultivation expanded. Millet and sorghum are generally better adapted to dry conditions, and the report argues that their decline weakens resilience to erratic rainfall while narrowing diets and on-farm biodiversity.
Kenya, however, is also emerging as an important test of the proposed alternative. The country launched its National Agroecology Strategy for Food System Transformation 2024–2033, with an estimated cost of Sh26.8 billion. The strategy promotes healthier soils, crop diversity, biological inputs, indigenous knowledge and reduced dependence on expensive external inputs.
Implementation at national level, however, remains uncertain. The report says many African agroecology strategies have been adopted without adequate budgets, indicators or institutional support. In Kenya, it finds that evidence of field-level impact is still limited.
According to the report, several county governments appear to be moving faster. Murang’a enacted an Agroecology Development Act in 2022 and adopted a 10-year policy, becoming the first Kenyan county to give agroecology the force of law. Vihiga and Makueni have since passed county policies, while Nakuru, West Pokot and Kiambu are among counties that have developed frameworks or are working on them.
The contrast now presents Kenya with a policy test. It has a national agroecology strategy and increasingly ambitious county laws, but much of its agricultural spending remains tied to fertiliser and commercial inputs.
