Sand mining and Kenya’s building boom: better rules are needed, but not from the top down

By Kennedy Mkutu, Associate Professor, International Relations, United States International University
Jan Bachmann, Senior Lecturer , University of Gothenburg

The sun is rising in Kenya’s Kajiado county, just outside Nairobi, and a truck is rumbling over dusty ground towards a riverbank. Young men guide the driver to a parking spot and then spring into action, each with a scoop, filling the truck from a heap of the most desirable building sand for which the area is famous.

The driver passes the time with a snack and a mug of tea poured from a flask by a mobile vendor. He pays each of the young men around US$10 for their labour and the landowner US$40-US$50 for the sand. The driver then starts out on his journey to deliver sand to hardware…

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