to make Kenya a respected and valued abroad, play a leading role in regional and Pan – African affairs, collaborate with international partners, uphold commitments to the international community and to expand Kenyan markets abroad.
H.E the president is the nation’s chief ambassador and Chief Executive officer. The conduct of foreign affairs is one of the executive powers expressly vested in him. To recapitulate therefore, Kenya’s foreign policy is the prerogative of H.E the president on behalf of the great people of Kenya.
Since his assumption of office, President Ruto has stepped up diplomatic outreaches with various countries with the aim of diversifying economic ties and deepening foreign relations. The president has made 39 foreign visits and we have hosted over 30 heads of states and governments, signing mega bilateral and multilateral agreements further stamping Kenya’s authority as a diplomatic powerhouse.

Benefits of the President’s Foreign Trips.

The president’s visits have yielded numerous benefits for our nation emphasizing our commitment to fostering international relations that enhance our economic

prosperity and global influence. These visits have secured investment partnerships and signing of agreements including;
• 350,000 job opportunities for Kenyans to work in Saudi Arabia and investments in renewable energy
• Talks with UK PM Rishi and inked deals worth $5bn in investments in Kenya;
• Official opening of the Kenyan embassy in Senegal;
• Signed and ratified East Africa One Area Network for Mobile Telephony with his Rwandan Counterpart President Paul Kagame;
• Established the Kenya-Djibouti business Council;
• Signed various MoUs in trade and investment, energy, ICT, transport, security, education, tourism, culture, agriculture, and the blue economy with his Congo Congo counterpart President Denis Sassou Ngweso and resumption of Kenya Airways flights to Brazzaville
• Opened a resident mission in Brazzaville;
• Signed US$60m program with Millennium Challenge Corporation CEO Alice Albright to help electrify buses that operate in Nairobi;
• Held bilateral talks with President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy who committed his government to establishing a grain hub in the Port of Mombasa to address food shortage in East Africa;
• United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) picked Nairobi, Kenya as its headquarters for Africa;

• Development Finance Corporation availed more than USD 863 million to Kenyan companies to fund health, MSMEs and Agribusiness facilitating private sector investment in key sectors of economy;
• Kenya bagged $75m EU grant for green investments.
• Chinese President Xi Jingping committed his country to opening Chinese markets to Kenyan agricultural produce, signed MoU aimed at and easing doing business with Kenya, the Chinese embassy has cancelled visa appointments for Kenyans as a result of this engagement;
• China signed MoU aimed at boosting investments in renewable energy within Kenya;
• President Ruto singed MoU with Chinese telecommunication company, Huawei to expedite Kenya’s digital transformation;
• Bilateral talks with PepsiCo’s CEO for Africa where he expressed PepsiCo’s interest in setting up operations in Nairobi.
NATIONAL TREE PLANTING AND CLIMATE ACTION EFFORTS

Africa loses about 15% of its GDP growth to climate change. Last year, Kenya lost 2.5 million livestock to drought resulting to an economic loss of more than KES 230 Billion. Resultant effects of climate change like floods and drought have effects on school drop outs, wildlife, agriculture and other key sectors of the economy.

The Kenya Kwanza administration targets to plant 15 billion trees in a span of 10 years for landscape and ecosystem restoration in the country. The program targets restoration of 10.6 million ha across 11 intervention areas, namely:

 Rehabilitation of degraded dryland landscapes; Growing of agroforestry trees on farmlands; Establishment of commercial private forests; 

*Rehabilitation of degraded water towers, wetlands, and riparian areas outside gazetted forests;

Greening of infrastructure (Roads, railway lines, dams) and tree planting by corporates and Ministries, Departments and Agencies(MDAs); 

*Rehabilitation of degraded natural forests in gazetted forests and water towers; Establishment of Bamboo woodlots and plantations; 
 

*Rehabilitation of degraded mangrove ecosystems; Growing of fruit trees and woodlots in schools, colleges, universities and other institutions; Restocking of forest plantation in gazetted forests; 

*Establishment of urban forests, arboretum, green spaces and road-side plantings.

The programme has adopted a whole of government, whole of society approach where all government entities, private sector players and citizenry have a role to play in the tree growing that is strongly anchored on the Bottom- up Economic Transformation Agenda (BETA), visualized to be a game changer towards achieving the objectives of the programme.

During this short rains, the Ministry of Environment, Climate Change and Forestry targets to grow 500 million trees by the end of the season. The National Tree Growing Day provided a significant impetus of accelerating the number of seedlings planted. The manual tallying as at 14th November 2023 shows that the country planted over 150 million trees.

 So far, a total of 10,794,604 have been documented in Jaza Miti. We encourage all Kenyans to record the trees grown in Jaza Miti App (available on PlayStore) to enable the Ministry of Environment, Climate Change and Forestry to track and report for decision making.

The Ministry of Environment, Climate Change and Forestry has mounted capacity building and skills development of MDAs, private sector and local communities to enable timely reporting of all trees grown. The Ministry is therefore calling upon all stakeholders to support the tree growing programme so as to achieve our short rains target.

COST OF LIVING

The Government is doing all what is possible to bring down the cost of living so as to give our people a comfortable and affordable way of life. This is manifest in the efforts employed so far even as President Ruto’s administration faces the challenge of saving the country from the unsustainable debt, now and in the future, by ensuring self-reliance in financing the national budget.
On the Cost of Fuel
Kenya Kwanza Government, is a listening government. The government has stabilized fuel prices by up to KES 19.82 per liter resulting to a reduction in the retail pump prices of diesel and kerosene. This price stabilization has cushioned Kenyans against the projected increase in fuel prices attributed to the rise of landed cost of imported fuel. Without this stabilization, petrol would retail at KES 229.37, diesel 223.29 and Sh 206.70 for kerosene saving consumers KES 12.01, KES 19.82 and KES 3.64 for petrol, diesel and kerosene respectively.
This is in addition to a raft of other initiatives including subsidized fertilizer whose price was reduced from Ksh.6500 to Ksh. 2,500. According to farmers, reduced cost of crop farming while attaining increased yields in turn, contributing to food security. This has in essence, seen the cost of Unga drop from KES 250 a year ago, to between Ksh.145 and Ksh.175 depending on the brand and sale outlet in our liberalized market economy
The cost of other commodities is also dropping as a result of the government’s deliberate effort of subsidizing production, not consumption.