•Growth was buoyed by significant growths in accommodation and food service (26%), as the tourism industry recorded a strong performance in the year to December.
•Activities in financial and insurance sectors also grew 14.7 per cent while information and communication sector grew by 7.3 per cent.
The agricultural sector and service industry remained key drivers of the economy as the country's real GDP grew by 5.9 per cent in the third quarter of 2023, official data shows.
This is up compared to 4.3 per cent in the corresponding quarter of 2022, data by the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics shows, as the country recorded an improvement on exports amid a reduction in the trade deficit.
During the review quarter, agriculture, forestry and fishing activities’ gross value added rose by 6.7 per cent compared to a contraction of 1.3 per cent in the third quarter of 2022, owing to favourable weather conditions that characterised the better part of 2023.
In addition, the growth was also buoyed by significant growths in accommodation and food service (26%), as the tourism industry recorded a strong performance in the year to December.
“The substantial growth in accommodation and food activities was manifest in the significant increase in the number of visitor arrivals in the country,” KNBS director general Macdonald Obudho noted.
Activities in financial and insurance sectors also grew 14.7 per cent while information and communication sector grew by 7.3 per cent.
However, transportation and storage activities gross value added decelerated from 5.1 per cent in the third quarter of 2022 to 2.8 per cent during the review period, partly attributable to high cost of petroleum fuels.
The macroeconomic indicators showed mixed performance during the quarter under review as inflation eased from an average of 8.67 per cent recorded in the third quarter of 2022, to 6.93 per cent in the quarter under review.
The agricultural sector remained critical in driving export earnings as the country’s earnings from exports continued to grow, increasing by 19.7 per cent to Sh270 billion, while imports declined slightly to Sh596.2 billion in the quarter under review.
“Increased export earnings from tea and horticulture partly occasioned the growth in exports,” KNBS said.
Fruit exports rose by 84.3 per cent from 32,388.1 metric tonnes in the third quarter of 2022 to 59,684.5 metric tonnes in the period under review.
Similarly, vegetable exports and tea production rose by 35.4 per cent and 28.0 per cent to stand at 20,427.1 metric tonnes and 138,771.6 metric tonnes, respectively, in the third quarter of 2023. Intake of milk by processors also increased.
However, production of sugarcane witnessed a decrease in the third quarter of 2023, with sugarcane deliveries declining by 55.1 per cent from 1.9 million metric tonnes in the third quarter of 2022, to 874, 000 metric tonnes during the review period.
Manufacturing, another key sector of the economy , recorded a growth of 2.6 per cent compared to the 1.8 per cent recorded in a similar period last year, with food products growth supported by processing of dairy and tea products.
Milk deliveries to processors increased by 12.5 per cent from 187 million litres in the third quarter of 2022 to 210 million litres in the third quarter of 2023.
Tea production increased from 108.4 thousand metric tonnes in the third quarter of 2022 to 138.8 thousand metric tonnes in the corresponding quarter of 2023.
“The growth of manufacture of food products was constrained by processing of sugar. Sugar production declined by 56.1 per cent to stand at 77.7 thousand metric tonnes in the third quarter of 2023,”KNBS said.
In the manufacture of non-food products growth was supported by production of cement, which grew by 6.8 per cent to stand at 2,541.8 thousand tonnes in the third quarter of 2023.
Credit advanced to enterprises in the manufacturing sector amounted to Sh620.9 billion as at September 2023, compared to Sh508.8 billion as at September 2022.
The country’s current account balance improved to a deficit of Sh122.5 compared to a deficit of 211.6 billion in a similar period of 2022.
Similarly, merchandise trade deficit narrowed from Sh373.1 billion in the third quarter of 2022 to Sh 326.2 billion in the same quarter of 2023, and mainly supported the improved current account balance.