The expectation that large-scale investments will spur economic development and reduce poverty in Africa’s drylands is not unique to the agricultural, extractives and renewable energy industries. This idea has also been embraced in the humanitarian industry, where organisations like the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) are seeking models of aid delivery that respond to both the immediate needs of refugees and to the longer-term development agendas of the countries and communities that host them. By re-conceptualising refugee aid as an investment in development, humanitarian organisations are attempting to rekindle enthusiasm among fatigued funders and make the presence of refugees more palatable to host governments.

One of the most ambitious efforts in this regard has been the Kalobeyei Integrated Socio-Economic Development Programme (KISEDP), located in the drylands of Turkana West sub-county near Kenya’s north-western border with South Sudan (see Map 7.1). KISEDP envisions a new model of refugee assistance that leverages humanitarian funding to promote local development and economic growth. The plan encompasses a territory of over 15,000 km2, but its core vision has focused on a newly constructed 15km2 settlement, located just 10 km from the decades-old Kakuma refugee camp. Like the camp, the settlement is designed as a place of asylum and protection for refugees. But it is also a site of investments in physical infrastructure and human capital that are intended to improve social service delivery to the local population, stimulate market activity, and attract the private sector to this economically marginalised area. These investments are substantial: implementation of KISEDP is expected to cost around US$500 million in the first five-year period (2018–2022). Insofar as KISEDP covers just one of Turkana’s six sub-counties, this is a steep increase from the US$750 million estimated for the entire county’s development plan in the previous five-year period (2013–2017).

This chapter describes the vision for economic growth and regional transformation upon which the Kalobeyei Settlement was devised, as well as the perspectives of local residents whose needs and expectations do not align with the grand designs of planners and politicians. It draws on eight months of fieldwork conducted prior to the establishment of the settlement and throughout the first three years of its implementation. Interviewees ranged from agency employees to location chiefs, refugee leaders, business owners, shopkeepers and pastoralists.