The Government of Kenya’s overriding objective is to avail to all its citizens the opportunity to live a quality life within a clean and secure environment as envisaged in the country’s primary development blueprint, the Kenya Vision 2030. In pursuit of this objective, the Government places great emphasis on achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) as a panacea for attaining balanced socio-economic development.

As the MDGs period comes to an end by 2015, this report provides a summary of the progress made towards attaining the MDGs in Kenya. It elaborates on key achievements and highlights challenges that threaten the achievement of the MDGs targets. The report also enumerates on-going interventions that have been undertaken to increase the likelihood of achieving the stipulated MDG targets.

Kenya has been a proponent and champion of the MDGs since their inception in 2000. Indeed, each of the target has been localized to form part of our development objectives. A case in point is that the Kenya Vision 2030 envisages a situation where by the year 2030, Kenya will have established itself as an industrializing, middle-income country, with the capacity to provide a high quality of life to all its citizens. The Social Pillar of the Vision in particular, focuses on establishing a just and cohesive society, where individuals enjoy equitable, social development while living in a clean and secure environment. This indeed, espouses the spirit of the MDGs.

Within the last decade, our country has made commendable economic progress even though poverty continues to be the greatest challenge in the pursuit of our socio-economic objectives. Although the share of the poorest quintile in national consumption has more than doubled in the last decade, inequalities and disparities continue to exist in spite of our rapid economic growth. We are impressed with the progress made in the pursuit of universal education through the provision of Free Primary School Education (FPE). Within the Health sector, significant strides have been made in combating diseases such as HIV and AIDS, Malaria and Tuberculosis. Moreover, there has been a renewed momentum in addressing child and maternal mortality since His Excellency, the President of the Republic of Kenya graciously waived the previously mandatory charges for deliveries in public health institutions. There has also been positive progress in the regeneration of our forest cover.

The corner stone of the Millennium Declaration was that while developing countries were expected to improve their governance structures, on their part, developed countries would provide adequate funding for development. However developed countries have not always honoured their obligations perhaps because their economies have also been confronted with hitherto unforeseen challenges. External resources especially the much needed Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) is critical in enhancing the country’s capacity to address the numerous MDGs targets. Kenya, just like many other countries is faced with huge developmental priorities in comparison to domestically available resources.

This Report is significant in that it provides an overview of the achievements made so far prior to the end-term review of the MDGs in 2015. The Government, will spare no efforts in this last stretch of the stipulated term to ensure that, we fast track all the MDGs targets lagging behind. This will require collaboration, commitment and effective participation of all stakeholders. As a nation we will continue to re-affirm our commitment to the MDGs and their achievement even as we begin to reflect on the post-2015 Agenda.