Women’s Participation in Governance and Political Processes in Kenya: Threats and Proposed Remedies

The most recent studies on women’s political participation demonstrate that women are consistently denied adequate space and a level playing field to participate in politics and governance, especially in many global south countries, unlike their male counterparts. These studies’ most dominant claim is that these contexts’ patriarchal cultural norms mainly limit women’s central involvement in such nations’ political processes. Based on this impediment system, it follows that these environments become more unpropitious, hostile, and insecure for women in politics, which opens up and perpetuates possibilities for all manner of harm to them. Because of such threats, several scholars, religious leaders, and women activists decry the underrepresentation of women in politics, which in their understanding, has contributed to prolonged systemic discrimination through a legacy of insufficient woman-centric legislation and policy interventions. There is a consensus-based claim among the majority of these actors that this kind of inadequacy continues unabated due to a siloed thinking that inhibits a joined-up approach in tackling such discrimination. This paper seeks to further explore this claim through a broad stroke integrated review of literature that deals with women’s political participation in Kenya, where the concept of traditional gender role beliefs provides a vital backdrop for conducting it. Based on this concept’s valuable terms of reference, it is concluded that women need to be accorded a more enabling environment to participate in politics and, in this way, ensure that their ascension to leadership positions in governance becomes tenable. It is anticipated that such an assumption will increase legislation, policy and other interventions geared towards safeguarding women’s general participation in politics. In light of such conclusion, it is proposed that groundswell support is needed to ensure that the creation of a conducive environment for women to be involved in politics is realized, and in this way, their disenfranchisement based on their limited participation in politics is tackled.

Revisiting household coordinates for CCAFS Baseline in the initial regions: East Africa, West Africa and Indo-Gangetic Plains

In 2010-2012, the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) implemented a baseline in 15 sites across three initial target regions: East Africa, West Africa and Indo-Gangetic Plains. The baseline was setup in such a way that the households selected could be a revisited after five and ten years. The aim is to track behavioral change over time in each of the sites by collecting agricultural and household data. Through analyzing the collected data, the aim is to promote a food-secure world through the provision of science-based efforts that support sustainable agriculture and enhance livelihoods while adapting to climate change and conserving natural resources and environmental services

Development and Investigation of Unique Organic Materials to Detect Disease Biomarkers

Chemomechanical polymer gels with the capability of recognizing specific biological molecules are promising materials for many biomedical applications. Glucose-selective hydrogels have potential utility in the continuous monitoring of glucose and glucose-triggered insulin delivery for the management of diabetes. Herein, the development and study of the first material which detects glucose via significant volume changes in the challenging matrix human blood plasma is described. The material was created via the modification of PMMA with supramolecular binding sites. The polymer exhibits excellent selectivity and reversibility including continuous expansion-contraction cycles

The phytochemistry and biological activity of secondary metabolites from Kenyan Vernonia and Vepris species.

Thesis (Ph.D.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Westville, 2012.This work is an account of the phytochemical analysis of two genera, Vernonia and Vepris which are used as remedies for illness by the Kalenjin community of Kenya. Species of Vernonia are known to yield sesquiterpene lactones, which typify the genus whereas Vepris is rich in alkaloids and limonoids which have a wide range of biological activities. The species studied in this work were Vernonia auriculifera, Vernonia urticifolia, Vepris glomerata and Vepris uguenensis. Phytochemical studies revealed a range of compounds being present in the four species. From Vernonia, triterpenoids, a sesquiterpene amine, a carotenoid and a polyene were isolated. This was the first account of a sesquiterpene amine from a plant species and the first account of the novel polyene. The triterpenoids showed moderate antibacterial activity, with b-amyrin acetate and oleanolic acid being effective at decreasing adhesion of selected gram-negative and gram-positive bacteria. Lutein and urticifolene showed good antibacterial activity against Enterococcus feacium and Pseudomonas aeruginosa. In Vepris, a range of compounds were isolated, belonging to the furoquinoline alkaloids, coumarins, flavonoids, cinnamic acid derivatives, lignins, cinnamaldehydes, triterpenoids and limonoids. Five new compounds; a cinnamaldehyde derivative (glomeral), two flavonoids (veprisinol, uguenenprenol) and two A, D-seco-limonoids (uguenensene and uguenensone) were amongst the compounds isolated. Antibacterial studies showed that glomeral inhibited the growth of Staphylococcus aureus and Shigella dysentrieae at low concentrations (MIC of 2 μg mLˉ¹ and 0.4 μg mLˉ¹ respectively). Antioxidant assays of several compounds revealed that, veprisinol, isohaplopine-3,3’-dimethylallyl ether, uguenenprenol and 7-O-methylaromadenrin are good antioxidant agents. The limonoids isolated from Vepris uguenensis also make up an interesting biogenetic relationship. Structural elucidation was carried out by 1D and 2D NMR spectroscopy in conjuction with mass spectrometry, infrared, ultraviolet and circular dichroism analysis where applicable. Biological assays were carried out using standard methods at laboratories in the University of KwaZulu-Natal and Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI-Nairobi)

A Model for early detection of potato late blight disease: a case Study in Nakuru County

Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Information Technology (MSIT) at Strathmore UniversityThe agricultural sector has been a key backbone to Kenya’s economy. Agriculture has played a key role in the economy through agricultural farm produce exports and job creation hence improving and maintaining good farming practices is critical in ensuring agricultural yields. Potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) is a major food and cash crop for the country, widely grown by small-scale farmers in the Kenyan highlands. However, early detection of potato diseases such as potato late blight still remains a challenge for both farmers and agricultural extension officers.Consequently agricultural extension officers who play a critical role in training and creating awareness on sound agricultural practices are few and often lack sufficient knowledge and tools.Current techniques used for determining and detecting of crop diseases have heavily relied upon use human vision systems that try to examine physical and phenotypic characteristics such as leaf and stem color. This technique is indeed important for diagnosis of crop diseases, however the use of this technique is not efficient in supporting early detection of crop diseases. This study proposed use of sensors and back propagation algorithm for the prediction of potato late blight disease. Temperature and humidity sensor probes placed on the potato farms were instrumental in monitoring conditions for potato late blight disease. These parameters constituted abiotic factors that favor the development and growth of Phytophthora infestants. Back propagation neural network model was suitable for the prediction of potato late blight disease. In designing the potato late blight prediction model, historical weather data, potato variety tolerance on late blight disease was used to build an artificial neural network disease prediction model.Incoming data streams from the sensors was used to determine level and risk of blight. This study focused on a moderate susceptible cultivator of potato in developing the model. The algorithm was preferred due to its strengths in adaptive learning. The developed model achieved an accuracy of 93.89% while the precision obtained was 0.949. The recall ratio from the neural network was 0.968 and an F-measure of 0.964

Evaluation of Factors Influencing Access to Credit Financial Services: Evidence from Smallholder Farmers in Eastern Region of Kenya

The access to credit financial services by the rural smallholder farmers in many occasions has revolutionized the rural development in a sustainable manner, and has greatly contributed to household food security and poverty reduction. This study sought to establish the main factors that affect smallholder farmers’ access to credit financial services in the Eastern region of Kenya using logistic regression model. The marginal effects results indicated that, education level, main occupation, and group membership were statistically significant with positive effects on access to credit financial services. However, household income was found to be significant with negative effects on access to credit financial services. Overall, this paper concludes with implication for policy to establish credit/loans offices close to farmers in order to reduce lending procedures, risks, and educate them on perceptions on loan repayment. Moreover, the government should enhance the development of local credit and distribution systems as well as enforcement of credit input services in form of in-kind lending to reduce fungibility into consumption expenditures. Finally, there is an urgent need for effective insurance training programs to mitigate the risks in farming, as well as financial literacy programs to familiarize smallholder farmers with the skills required to effectively understand, assess and utilize credit financial services towards enhancing their agricultural activities. Keywords: Evaluation; Smallholders; Credit Access; Financial Services; Eastern region; Keny

Efficiency of the markov regime switching GARCH Model in modelling volatility for tea prices

A Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of Science in Mathematical Finance (MSc.MF) at Strathmore UniversityThis study examines the ability of the Markov Regime Switching GARCH model, in comparison with the univariete GARCH models, in modelling and forecasting price volatility of the tea traded at the Mombasa Tea Auction within some time horizon. The study uses weekly data, from 2010 to 2017, to analysis regime switching in volatility and provides an in-sample and out-of-sample forecast. Volatility regime switching is first modelled with a Markov switching framework. In-sample and out-of-sample forecasts of volatility using competing MRS-GARCH models and the single regimes GARCH models are then provided. Comparison of in-sample forecast is done on the basis of goodness-of-fit and the comparison of the out-of-sample forecasts is done on the basis of forecast accuracy, using the statistical loss function. The results show that the MRS-GARCH models can remove the high persistence of GARCH models. This shows the priority of MRS-GARCH models and provides evidence of regime clustering. In out-of-sample forecast perfomance, the MRS-GARCH models were better than the single regime GARCH model. However, this superioirity fades for longer time horizon

Conceptualising community radio: from global histories to the Kenyan example

This study sets out to gain insight into the way that the establishment of community radio in Kenya is located within the global history of ideas about such radio. The first four chapters in this study provide terms of reference for this examination through a series of literature reviews. It sets out, firstly, to locate the internationally shared conceptualisaiton of community radio within an existing spectrum of approaches to social analysis. It proposes that community radio can be located at the critical, emancipatory end of this spectrum. It then maps out the global circulation of ideas about community radio and proposes that such circulation was informed by the broader history of critical, emancipatory social analysis. The final literature review then deals with community radio in Kenya and examines the way in which the establishment of this sector was shaped by the social and political history of this country. It is argued that the establishment of a community radio sector became possible only when support for emancipatory approaches to media became acceptable in Kenya, in context of the establishment of multiparty democracy. It is proposed, further, that the articulation of a vision for community radio in Kenya depended in part on the existence of international support for such radio and in part on the efforts of local actors in civil society. The empirical component then focuses on the way global ideas about community radio have become realised in Kenya. The study achieves this purpose by drawing on qualitative interviews with individuals from within civil society who have participated in the history of the establishment and growth of community radio in Kenya. These individuals demonstrate consciousness of the internationally shared set of principles that can facilitate a successful establishment of community radio. However, they are also sceptical of the assumption that guidelines for community radio are universally applicable. They point, in particular, to the challenges involved in the realisation of these guidelines in an environment in which economic resources are limited, and which is characterised by extreme social inequality and conflict. The study concludes that it is individuals such as these participants, who are embedded within the local context, who are best placed to articulate locally appropriate alternatives to these guidelines