OPINION: Kenya's maritime advantage starts with its people

Kenya's maritime sector moved more cargo in 2025 than in any year on record. Behind that milestone sits a simpler story: an industry that already supports almost a quarter of the national economy, and one whose next chapter will be written as much by the people it trains and employs as by the vessels that call at its ports.

The scale is worth restating. Kenya's maritime sector now underpins goods trade worth an estimated Ksh.3.8 trillion a year, equivalent to around 23 per cent of the country's nominal GDP.

More than 40 shipping lines call regularly at its ports, not only connecting Kenyan exporters and importers to global markets but building value chains to neighbours across the region, from Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi to South Sudan, Ethiopia and eastern DRC.

Kenya's ports are, in a very real sense, becoming the operating system for East and Central African trade.

Lamu's throughput grew more than tenfold in a single year, rising from around 74,000 tonnes in 2024 to close to 800,000 tonnes in 2025, evidence that Kenya's maritime gateway is expanding along its coastline, not fixed in one place.

As the country invests in new corridors and port capacity, the opportunities that come with them should be understood as national, not merely coastal or metropolitan.

The most important of these opportunities is the one that gets talked about least: jobs. Kenya's maritime economy already supports more than 30,000 Kenyans in customs clearance, freight forwarding and warehousing alone, alongside roughly 3,500 people directly employed in shipping and agency operations.   

The Bandari Maritime Academy has trained more than 5,000 people to date and now enrolls around 1,500 cadets a year, a pipeline of skilled Kenyans moving into an industry that, globally, is often overlooked as a career path.

Maritime careers are hands-on, technically skilled and tied to a sector that is expanding rather than shrinking.

They also carry a genuinely international dimension, offering the kind of exposure to global systems, standards and networks that few domestic career paths can match.

For a country with one of the youngest populations in the region, that combination deserves more visibility than it currently gets.

All of this, before even mentioning the jobs and employment opportunities for countless Kenyans working in local industries that are enabled by shipping.   

Sourcing in Kenya becomes more attractive for overseas buyers when sailings are easier and logistics more dependable, generating more business for Kenyan businesses and farmers. Inputs arrive more reliably and inexpensively for local manufacturing.

Investment in value-adding production becomes more attractive for local and foreign investors alike, as increased connectivity makes markets more accessible.

Kenya is well placed to ensure that the benefits of maritime growth reach deep into its economy. Important measures of success include how many Kenyans are advancing into senior and technical positions within shipping and logistics, how much skills and technology transfer is taking place, how much local procurement and training is happening, and how much investment is being committed to the country.

These are the kinds of outcomes that can be tracked, reported on and improved over time, and they speak directly to Kenya's long-term interest.

None of this happens by accident. It requires continued investment in terminals and hinterland connections, in training infrastructure too, in smart-port technology and automation, and in the digital systems that keep modern supply chains moving.

It also requires a shift in how Kenya discusses its maritime future. This is not a sector resisting change; it is one asking to help design it.

That requires regulatory frameworks that are shaped through ongoing dialogue between government and industry and that are predictable, proportionate and responsive to how quickly commercial conditions can move.  

That kind of partnership is already taking shape. Shipping lines and their agents bring international capital, greener fuels and technologies, and decades of operational expertise drawn from some of the world's busiest trade routes, and carrying by sea more than 80% of global trade.

What Kenya's maritime sector needs in return is a stable, well-coordinated regulatory environment to support continued investment.

Kenya does not need to choose between attracting international shipping and building local opportunity. The two are intrinsically connected.

A larger, better-connected maritime sector, underpinned by global carriers and grown through Kenyan talent, is how the country strengthens both its trade position and its labour market at the same time, particularly as the African Continental Free Trade Area opens up new regional demand for efficient logistics.

Kenya's maritime sector has huge potential, both for the country as a whole and for individual Kenyans. It is asking us to build what comes next, together with government, and with the thousands of young Kenyans for whom a job in the maritime sector, or in a maritime-enabled business, has yet to be discovered.

That is the real measure of Kenya's maritime advantage: not only the tonnes moved through its ports, but the people whose futures move with them.

The writer, Damian Viccars, is the Director of Government Affairs, World Shipping Council