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Thirteen ambassadors from the European Union have said Turkana will benefit from a five-year project to cost Sh450 billion.
The 13 EU ambassadors included Mette Knudsen (Denmark), Aline Kuster-Menager (France), Erik Lundberg (Finland), Fionnuala Quinlan (Ireland), Martin Klepetko (Czech Republic), Laszlo Eduard Mathe (Hungary), Jacek Bazański (Poland), Luisa Fragoso (Portugal), Julia Pataki (Romania), František Dlhopolček (Slovak Republic) and Javier Garcia de Viedma (Spain).
The envoys, led by EU Ambassador Simon Mordue, were in Turkana to inspect development projects and hand over assets to the county government, through the German Development Agency.
Mordue said the largest joint visit of European envoys chose Turkana because of the challenges the area still faces, despite investments by the national and county governments and development partners.
"Today is an example of what the EU does best. We are opening a bilateral programme funded by Germany that is situated within the overall context of the Sh450 billion of support that the EU and its member states are giving Kenya over the next five years," he said.
The assets donated were two vehicles, 20 motorcycle GPS gadgets and laptops as part of the technical cooperation facility Kenya Project.
Turkana Governor Josphat Nanok received the assets, saying they will support development in agriculture, health, education, water and the business sector in an effort to eradicate poverty.
He said the visit had enabled the envoys to have a perspective on the refugee integration programme and agreed that it was important that part of the support to refugees include investment in projects to benefit the local community.
“We had a two-day visit with EU ambassadors in Kakuma and Kalobeyei refugees’ settlement to discuss with the UNHCR and other partners to get the views of the refugees and host the work that government resources have been doing,” Nanok said.
German Ambassador Annette Gunther said three projects in the county funded through German Cooperation were supporting 60,000 residents directly and another 300,000 indirectly. The projects are Drought Resilience in Northern Kenya, Food and Nutrition Security and the Technical Cooperation Facility Kenya project.
