10 top commodities Kenyans Import (Quantities)

Published on June 30, 2018Updated on June 30, 2018

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By Abdullahi Jamaa
Kenya is a net importer of goods and services; this means that we produce less at home relying on other countries to supply us. Most of the country’s import comprises of essential commodities. Ironically Kenya prides itself as the economic powerhouse of East Africa.

In 2016 we exported $4.7B and in return imported $15.8B worth of goods and services. In the international trade, this is economically known as negative trade balance. This partly explains why most essential commodities are too expensive to purchase especially among the poor majority.

In fact, every passing year, the trend of import has been increasing both in quantities and values. There are more new products imported into the country, this created a proliferation of substandard goods.

To understand the extent of Kenya’s export and import business one has to analyze the latest figures available as far as our negative trade balance is concerned. In its economic survey of 2018, the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics pointed out that the ratio of export to import deteriorated from 40.4 percent in 2016 to 34 percent in 2017 and so the balance of trade widened from Ksh. 853.7 billion in 2016 to Khs.1,131.5 billion in 2017.

The last decade has seen an increase in the number of goods and services that we have imported. We have compiled a list of top ten commodities to understand what is happening in the country.

This list is not exhaustive, however, it gives you a rare glimpse of what the economy of our country is made up of. The quantity of measurement is tonnage and the year of reference is 2017.