Household Financial Literacy: The Case of Nonperforming Consumer Credit in Kenya

Household financial literacy is integral in the financial planning process of formulating, executing, and monitoring personal decisions into a consolidated plan that directs households to realize their overall financial and life goals. These includes meeting monthly living expenses, and goals in investment, educational, retirement, tax and legacy planning. However, the Kenyan credit market is encountering an increase in defaults and non-performing loans(NPLs), negatively impacting on household financial planning process. This study examined the effect of financial literacy on nonperforming household credit in Kenya using a fixed effects least squares dummy variables panel data approach. Nonperforming household credit was used as a proxy for financial literacy. Using data from the Central Bank of Kenya, the study analyzed sectoral credit distribution to agricultural, real estate, and household sectors, with the agricultural sector used as the reference period in the formulation of the dummy variables. The results found an inverse relationship between nonperforming loans and lending interest rates and a positive correlation with the gross domestic product growth rate. This indicates that the Kenyan financial system is still underdeveloped and operating in the short-run asymmetric condition, whereby commercial banks cannot fulfill their fiduciary requirements, but continue loading consumers with loans without regard to applicable financial planning practice standards for personal financial planning to enable households  meet their financial and life goals. Despite reported economic growth, the increasing level of nonperforming consumer credit necessitates a review of the country's monetary and fiscal policies to ensure that economic growth is consistent with the prevailing macroeconomic indicators of unemployment, interest rates, and nonperforming credit. To increase household financial literacy, the study suggests curriculum development to incorporate personal financial planning education in tertiary institutions and Universities like the American Certified Financial Planning (C.F.P.) to augment courses provided by the Kenya Accountants and Secretaries National Examinations Board (KASNEB). Keywords:Household financial literacy, Nonperforming loans, Household credit, Least squares dummy variable DOI: 10.7176/RJFA/14-20-05 Publication date: December 31st 2023

Effect of education and gender on household ownership of asset types in rural Western Kenya Region

Asset development is a key strategy to promote economic and social development. Measurement of inequality has been given relatively little attention to the asset ownership by households. The study examines relative importance of asset types and extent to which household headship factors affect ownership among households of Western Kenya. The study was cross sectional descriptive using quantitative methods. A total of 538 households were selected for the study comprising 184(34%) households with under-five death and 355(66%) as controls. Findings show that the extent to which asset types demonstrate significant differential inequality in ownership (p-value <0.05) varies by household headship factors, where gender clustered by education shows the highest number of asset types exhibiting significant inequality 17(50%) between households; followed by education 7(21%) and lastly gender 4(12%). Results underscore importance of high education, although the impact is different across the different genders.The impact is greater among the male headed households Key Words: Rural households, asset types, asset ownership, household headship, education, gender

Clinical and Financial Implications of Medicine Consumption Patterns at a Leading Referral Hospital in Kenya to Guide Future Planning of Care

Background: Medicines can constitute up to 70% of total health care budgets in developing countries as well as considerable expenditure in hospitals. Inventory management techniques can assist with managing resources efficiently. In Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH), a leading hospital in Kenya, over 30% of medical expenses are currently allocated to medicines, and this needs to be optimally managed. Objective: To investigate drug consumption patterns, their costs and morbidity patterns at KNH in recent year. Methodology: Cross-sectional retrospective record review. Inventory control techniques, ABC (Always, Better, Control), VEN (Vital, Essential and Non-essential) and ABC-VEN matrix analysis used to study drug expenditure patterns. Morbidity data extracted from the Medical Records. Results: Out of an average of 811 medicine types procured annually (ATC 5), 80% were formulary drugs and 20% were non-formulary. Class A medicines constituted 13.2% to 14.2% of different medicines procured each year but accounted for an average of 80% of total annual drug expenditure. Class B medicines constituted 15.9%-17% of all the drugs procured yearly but accounted for 15% of the annual expenditure, whilst Class C medicines constituted 70% of total medicines procured but only 5% of the total expenditure. Vital and Essential medicines consumed the highest percentage of drug expenditure. ABC-VEN categorization showed that an average of 31% medicine types consumed an average of 85% of total drug expenditure. Therapeutic category and Morbidity patterns analysis showed a mismatch between drug expenditure and morbidity patterns in over 85% of the categories. Conclusion: Class A medicines are few but consume the largest proportion of hospital drug expenditure. Vital and essential items consume the highest drug expenditure, and need to be carefully managed. ABC-VEN categorization identified medicines were major savings could potentially be made helped by Therapeutic category and Morbidity pattern analysis. There was a high percentage of non-formulary items, which needs to be addressed. Inventory control techniques should be applied routinely to optimize medicine use within available budgets especially in low and middle income countries. This is now being implemented

Participatory Farmer Evaluation of Stem borer Resistant Maize varieties in three maize growing ecologies of Kenya

Insect Resistant Maize for Africa Project (IRMA) aims at developing and deploying insect resistant maize varieties to reduce grain losses due to insect pests. As part of incorporating farmer’s perceptions and improving the adoption of the developed varieties, participatory approaches are adopted. The paper analysis farmer’s preferences of maize germplasm developed through conventional breeding. The paper uses data collected from evaluations conducted at the end of 2006 April and October rains. Nine stem borer resistant maize varieties were evaluated alongside six commercial checks in the moist transitional zones (East and West) at vegetative and harvest stage, while in the dry transitional zone and dry mid altitude zones, 6 new varieties were evaluated together with four commercial checks at harvest stage. Each variety was assessed on a scale of 1(very poor) to 5 (very good) based on key criteria generated in earlier group discussions with farmers and overall score. Data was analyzed using ordinal regression model of Social Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). In DT zone, Katumani, CKIR06007 and CKIR06008 were more preferred to the checks based on overall score. CKIR06008 was also more preferred on yield and tolerance to insect pest criteria, while CKIR04002, CKIR06009, and CKIR04003 were perceived more superior to local check based on tolerance to insect pests. In moist transitional zone Embu only CKIR06005 was more preferred (p<0.01) to the check at harvest stage in April 2006 season based on early maturity. While there was no preference for the new varieties at vegetative stage in Embu in October rains 2006 season, a number of new varieties CKIR06001, CKIR06002, CKIR06003, CKIR06004, and CKIR06005 were more preferred based on early maturity at harvest in October rains 2006 season. In the moist transitional zone (west), CKIR06005 and CKIR06005 were more preferred on maturity criteria but CKIR06004 also had good attributes in terms of cob size vegetative stage in April rains 2007. We conclude that farmers perceive some varieties to have good tolerance to insect pests in addition to good yield and maturity characteristics attributes, which are critical to the farmers in the adoption of new varieties.Crop Production/Industries,

Clinical and financial implications of medicine consumption patterns in Kenya

Introduction: Medicines can constitute up to 70% of total health care budgets in developing countries and considerable expenditure in hospitals. Inventory management techniques can assist with managing resources efficiently. In Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH) over 30% of expenditures are for medicines and this needs optimal management. Consequently, we investigated drug consumption patterns, their costs and morbidity patterns at KNH. Methodology: Cross-sectional retrospective record review. Inventory control techniques, ABC (Always, Better, Control), VEN (Vital, Essential and Non-essential) and ABC-VEN matrix analyses were used to study drug expenditure patterns. Morbidity data extracted from Medical Records. Results: An average of 811 medicine types are procured annually (ATC 5), 80% were formulary drugs and 20% were non-formulary. Class A medicines constituted 13.2% to 14.2% of different medicines procured each year but accounted for an average of 80% of total annual drug expenditure. Class B medicines constituted 15.9%-17% of all medicines procured but accounted for 15% of annual expenditure, whilst Class C medicines constituted 70% of total medicines procured but only 5% of total expenditure. Vital and Essential medicines consumed the highest proportion of drug expenditure. ABC-VEN categorization showed 31% medicine types consumed an average of 85% of total expenditure. Therapeutic category and morbidity patterns analysis showed a mismatch between expenditure and morbidity which needs investigation. Conclusion: Class A medicines are few but consume the largest proportion of hospital drug expenditure. Vital and essential items account for the highest drug expenditure, and also need to be carefully managed. ABC-VEN categorization identified medicines were major savings could potentially be made helped by Therapeutic category and Morbidity pattern analysis. There was a high percentage of non-formulary items, which needs to be addressed. Inventory control techniques should be applied routinely to optimize medicine use within hospitals within available budgets especially in low and middle income countries. This is now being implemented

Scale-up supply and utilization of precooked beans for food and nutrition security, incomes and environmental conservation by leveraging on public-private partnerships in Kenya and Uganda

The project aimed at leveraging public-private partnerships to scale up utilization of precooked bean innovations for food and nutrition security, income generation and environmental conservation in a gender equitable manner. The project worked with 20,558 farmers (6,962 men; 9,893 women; and 3,703 youth) adding 1,659 farmers in this phase compared to Phase 1 (18,899). This report provides details of project results including: increasing productivity by 17% with a trading value of CAD$154,667 along with decreased energy demand (such as charcoal and wood burning); and as well, freeing up women’s time constraints. The project was successful even considering pandemic conditions

Presence of the knockdown resistance mutation, Vgsc-1014F in Anopheles gambiae and An. arabiensis in western Kenya

INTRODUCTION: The voltage gated sodium channel mutation Vgsc-1014S (kdr-east) was first reported in Kenya in 2000 and has since been observed to occur at high frequencies in the local Anopheles gambiae s.s. POPULATION: The mutation Vgsc-1014F has never been reported from An. gambiae Complex complex mosquitoes in Kenya. FINDINGS: Molecularly confirmed An. gambiae s.s. (hereafter An. gambiae) and An. arabiensis collected from 4 different parts of western Kenya were genotyped for kdr from 2011 to 2013. Vgsc-1014F was observed to have emerged, apparently, simultaneously in both An. gambiae and An. arabiensis in 2012. A portion of the samples were submitted for sequencing in order to confirm the Vgsc-1014F genotyping results. The resulting sequence data were deposited in GenBank (Accession numbers: KR867642-KR867651, KT758295-KT758303). A single Vgsc-1014F haplotype was observed suggesting, a common origin in both species. CONCLUSION: This is the first report of Vgsc-1014F in Kenya. Based on our samples, the mutation is present in low frequencies in both An. gambiae and An. arabiensis. It is important that we start monitoring relative frequencies of the two kdr genes so that we can determine their relative importance in an area of high insecticide treated net ownership

Clinical and Financial Implications of Medicine Consumption Patterns at a Leading Referral Hospital in Kenya to Guide Future Planning of Care

Background: Medicines can constitute up to 70% of total health care budgets in developing countries as well as considerable expenditure in hospitals. Inventory management techniques can assist with managing resources efficiently. In Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH), a leading hospital in Kenya, over 30% of expenditure is currently allocated to medicines, and this needs to be optimally managed.Objective: To investigate drug consumption patterns, their costs and morbidity patterns at KNH in recent years.Methodology: Cross-sectional retrospective record review. Inventory control techniques, ABC (Always, Better, and Control), VEN (Vital, Essential, and Non-essential) and ABC-VEN matrix analyses were used to study drug expenditure patterns. Morbidity data was extracted from the Medical Records.Results: Out of an average of 811 medicine types procured annually (ATC 5), 80% were formulary drugs and 20% were non-formulary. Class A medicines constituted 13.2–14.2% of different medicines procured each year but accounted for an average of 80% of total annual drug expenditure. Class B medicines constituted 15.9–17% of all the drugs procured yearly but accounted for 15% of the annual expenditure, whilst Class C medicines constituted 70% of total medicines procured but only 5% of the total expenditure. Vital and Essential medicines consumed the highest percentage of drug expenditure. ABC-VEN categorization showed that an average of 31% of medicine types consumed an average of 85% of total drug expenditure. Therapeutic category and Morbidity patterns analysis showed a mismatch between drug expenditure and morbidity patterns in over 85% of the categories.Conclusion: Class A medicines are few but consume the largest proportion of hospital drug expenditure. Vital and essential items account for the highest drug expenditure, and need to be carefully managed. ABC-VEN categorization identified medicines where major savings could potentially be made helped by Therapeutic category and Morbidity pattern analysis. There was a high percentage of non-formulary items, which needs to be addressed. Inventory control techniques should be applied routinely to optimize medicine use within available budgets especially in low and middle income countries

Safety and benefits of interventions to increase folate status in malaria-endemic areas.

For decades, folic acid has routinely been given to prevent or treat anaemia in children, pregnant women and people with sickle cell disease. However, there is no conclusive evidence that folate deficiency anaemia constitutes a public health problem in any of these groups. Industrial flour fortification is recommended and implemented in many countries to combat neural tube defects. Dietary folates or folic acid can antagonise the action of antifolate drugs that play a critical role in the prevention and treatment of malaria. Randomised trials have shown that folic acid supplementation increases the rate of treatment failures with sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine. The efficacy of antifolate drugs against Plasmodium is maximized in the absence of exogenous folic acid, suggesting that there is no safe minimum dose of ingested folic acid. We here review the safety and benefits of interventions to increase folate status in malaria-endemic countries. We conclude that formal cost-benefit analyses are required