Kenya sets new reforms to restore efficiency on the Northern Corridor

Kenya, through the State Department for East African Community (EAC) Affairs outlined new reforms aimed at revitalizing the Northern Corridor.

Principal Secretary Dr. Caroline W. Karugu, speaking during a consultative meeting on Tuesday warned that Kenya is rapidly losing its competitive advantage in the region, hence could not afford to "sit pretty" while inefficiencies drive trade to competing routes like Dar es Salaam.

The findings follow a December 2025 monitoring exercise that identified critical systemic bottlenecks currently undermining Kenya's standing as the premier gateway to East Africa.

In response, the department has unveiled a radical strategic roadmap aimed at dismantling persistent Non-Tariff Barriers that have turned the Northern Corridor into a bottleneck for regional commerce.

The reforms include reduction of road blocks to the 5 gazetted stops, reducing RECTS Response to less than an hour and transit time to 36–48 hours.

The urgency of these reforms is underscored by the corridor’s role as an economic lifeline, currently handling over 35.84 million metric tonnes of cargo annually and facilitating more than 80% of Kenya’s transit trade.

Despite its importance, a comprehensive monitoring exercise conducted in December 2025 revealed a troubling decline in reliability, with Kenya losing between 5% and 8% of high-value transit cargo every year.

Dr. Karugu argued that these delays are not merely logistical headaches but represent a direct drain on national revenue and increase the cost of essential goods for consumers across the entire East African region.

Among the most significant hurdles identified is the proliferation of police roadblocks, which currently number between 22 and 27 along the corridor a staggering figure compared to the regional target of fewer than five.

This over-enforcement, combined with frequent ICT system failures and security response lags, has nearly doubled the transit time between Mombasa and Malaba from a target of 48 hours to an average of 80 hours.

According to the state department, the economic payoff for successfully implementing these reforms is expected to reach up to $54 million.

Transporters alone could save as much as $360 per trip if transit delays are cut by half. To ensure these goals are met, the State Department has established a strict action matrix with clear deliverables and timelines, promising that the initiative will not devolve into another "talk shop".