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11. Kenya is leading the first business alliance working to end hunger in Africa

  • The Business Alliance Against Chronic Hunger is coordinated by a Kenyan-based secretariat and has over 30 companies and organizations working to develop business-led solutions to hunger.
  • Alliance members have created 150 small-scale businesses and initiatives in a Kenyan pilot program.

Source: World Food Program, All Africa

10. Some of the oldest known paleontological records of man on earth have been found in Kenya

  • Several hominid fossils found in Kenya, including a homo habilis skull, which dates back 1.4 million years, and a homo erectus skull, dated at 1.5 million years old, have tagged Kenya the "cradle of mankind".
  • These fossils have contributed greatly to scientists being able to trace the history of the human species.

Source: New York Times

9. Kenya hosts the largest refugee camp in the world

  • Dadaab, the largest refugee camp in Kenya, provides shelter to 280,000 refugees.
  • Kenya is home to 320,605 refugees. In 2008 alone, 60,000 refugees crossed the border into Kenya seeking asylum.
  • Kenya is building even more camps to take on the increasing numbers of refugees escaping the instability in Somalia.
  • The recent forced shutdown of food aid operations in southern Somalia by Al Shabab, may push 20,000 Somali refugees into Kenyan camps.

Source: UNHCR, Associated Press, Christian Science Monitor

8. Kenya was the first country in Africa to use the new mobile-phone money transfer service

  • M-PESA customers can deposit and withdraw money from a network of agents that includes airtime resellers and retail outlets acting as banking agents.
  • The service enables its users to deposit and withdraw money, transfer money to other users and non-users, pay bills, and purchase cell minutes.

Source: Safaricom, BBC, Guardian

7. Kenya is the global leader in prosecuting pirates

  • The United States, Britain and the European Union have signed agreements allowing for piracy suspects to be tried in Kenya.
  • In 2006, Kenya established the Maritime Rescue Coordination Center in the port city of Mombasa, designed to provide a rapid response to acts of piracy.

Source: The Times, Law.com, IMO

6. There are 62 languages spoken in Kenya

  • Many Kenyans are multilingual, speaking several African languages and English.
  • Kenya has a rich multilingual history and Kenyan languages come from the Middle-East, Asia and Africa.
  • Swahili is spreading in popularity outside Kenya and is now widely spoken in parts of Uganda, Rwanda, Zambia and the Sudan.
  • The African languages of Kenya come from three different language families - Bantu languages spoken in the center and southeast, Nilotic languages spoken in the west and Cushitic languages spoken in the northeast.

Source: University of Toronto; Ethnologue, Languages of the World

5. Kenya was the first African country to adopt geothermal energy

  • Kenya has one of the largest geothermal energy programs in the world and the largest in Africa.
  • The largest geothermal power plant in Africa, the Olkaria II, is located near Nairobi and is operated by the Kenya Electricity Generating Company.
  • Kenya has other renewable energy programs ranging from wind to hydroelectric.

Source: International Geothermal Association; United Nations

4. Kenya is the only developing country that hosts a United Nations agency

  • The United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) became the first UN agency to be headquartered in Kenya in 1970.
  • Kenya has 26 UN Agencies comprising a total of 75 semi-autonomous UN offices employing some 3,000 local and international staff - the third largest concentration after New York and Geneva.
  • These agencies include:
  1. World Bank (WB)
  2. International Monetary Fund (IMF)
  3. United Nations Development Program (UNDP)
  4. United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR)
  5. United Nations Funds for Women (UNIFEM)
  6. Office of the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)
  7. World Health Organization (WHO)

Source: United Nations

3. Mombasa is the largest cargo-handling port in East Africa

  • In 2008, the port of Mombasa handled about 16.42 million tons of freight.
  • The port is equipped to recieve a wide range of cargoes, from dry bulks such as grain to liquid bulks such as crude oil.
  • 10 million people in Africa rely on food aid that comes through Mombasa. Last year, the port handled 670,000 tons of food aid.

Source: United Nations Economic Commission for Africa; Kenya Port Authority; Voice of America

2. Kenya is one of America's closest allies in the fight against Al-Qaeda

  • Kenya shares a 423 mile border with Somalia and is on the frontline against the growth of Islamic terrorism in the region.
  • The Kenyan Army worked with the U.S. to develop a Ranger Strike Force, to prevent the infiltration of terrorist groups into Kenya.
  • The Kenyan Air Force has procured F-5 fighter aircrafts to conduct counterterrorism surveillance and strike operations.
  • The Kenyan Navy has received training and equipment from the United States for maritime interdiction operations in territorial waters.

Source: U.S. Department of State

1. Africa's first woman Nobel Peace Prize winner came from Kenya

  • Professor Wangari Maathai, the Kenyan environmentalist, was awarded the prize in 2004 for her dedication to women's rights, ecology and democracy.
  • Professor Maathai was the first woman in East and Central Africa to earn a doctorate degree. She obtained a degree in Biological Sciences from Mount St. Scholastica College in Atchison, Kansas (1964).
  • A role model for world, Prof. Maathai travels the world addressing the critical issue of climate change.

Source: Nobel Prize Biographies