Flourishing Flowers, Withering Livelihoods: Social Networks for Food Security in Naivasha, Kenya

Kariuki Kirigia

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Chapter 9 Flourishing Flowers, Withering Livelihoods: Social Networks for Food Security in Naivasha, Kenya

In: Agricultural Intensification, Environmental Conservation, Conflict and Co-Existence at Lake Naivasha, Kenya

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Kariuki Kirigia

Kariuki Kirigia
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Type:: Chapter

Pages:: 198–221

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004695429_010

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Abstract

Foreign agribusiness investments are widely posited as drivers of local development in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) through aid for trade, an approach that is postulated to generate win-win outcomes for both the investor and the host country. One such key “win” is the creation of employment opportunities in the SSA context, where unemployment rates are extremely high. Critics, however, contend that these investments compete for important natural resources and labour essential for local development. A key question that emerges is how, through employment, these investments impact the quality of life of local populations in the host countries. I address this question by examining the status of food security among wage labourers in the foreign-investor-dominated floriculture sector in Naivasha, Kenya, under the premise that food constitutes a basic livelihood need that must be met as a bare minimum requirement for survival. In addition, food illuminates multiple aspects of life that deepen our understanding of wage labourers’ livelihoods. I employed structured and semi-structured interviews, ethnographic methods of observation, and informal conversations to engage with a select pool of interlocutors comprising wage labourers, floriculture companies, local market operators, and smallholder farmers. The findings of this research study challenge normative ideas of local development as conceived through the imaginaries of foreign agribusiness contributions by dint of wage labour and, by extension, technology transfer and food security, and discuss innovative strategies employed by wage labourers to secure food by leveraging key social networks.

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Agricultural Intensification, Environmental Conservation, Conflict and Co-Existence at Lake Naivasha, Kenya

Series: Africa-Europe Group for Interdisciplinary Studies, Volume: 34

E-Book ISBN:: 9789004695429

Publisher:: Brill

Print Publication Date:: 03 Jun 2024

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Chapter 9 Flourishing Flowers, Withering Livelihoods: Social Networks for Food Security in Naivasha, Kenya

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Agricultural Intensification, Environmental Conservation, Conflict and Co-Existence at Lake Naivasha, Kenya

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