Food Security for Refugee Youth in the North Western Region of Kenya: Vulnerability, Innovation and Policy Implications

This project aims to understand the relationship between migration corridors and food security through collaborative workshops on refugee youth food insecurity. It also aims to understand how diets change as youth leave their home countries and migrate through these corridors and their strategies for procuring food while in transit. Refugee youth will have access to online training about food security, social entrepreneurship, and vertical farming. The vertical farming intervention will allow refugee youth to learn to grow their food using a method that does not require large amounts of land. The overall vision of this research is to improve the food security of refugee youth within this migration corridor and provide them
with the ability to procure, grow, and sell food. Research questions addressed include: (1) What are the food sources and distribution channels since arriving in Kakuma Refugee Camp?
(2) In what ways have the variety and nutritional quality of food changed from their pre-migration period to within the migration corridor? (3) What role does gender play in food security for refugee youth? (4) What roles do or can refugee youth play in procuring, growing, and selling food, and how have these roles evolved? The project will use qualitative research methods for data collection, including participatory research approaches and youth-led evaluation and monitoring of the impacts of vertical farming. Focus groups and interviews will be conducted. All participants will be invited to a collaborative ideation workshop and given access to the online training platform.