Garissa County

Garissa exists because the Tana River exists—Kenya's longest river creates a thin margin of life through otherwise hostile desert, enabling the town that became northeastern Kenya's regional capital. The Somali pastoralists who dominate this county developed livestock systems adapted to extreme aridity: camels, goats, sheep, cattle—moved constantly to follow sparse vegetation and distant water sources.

For decades, Garissa served as Kenya's forgotten frontier: underdeveloped, insecure, marginalized from national political and economic life. The Somali communities inhabiting these lands experienced both neglect and suspicion from successive governments. Al-Shabaab's 2015 Garissa University attack killed 148 people, cementing the county's association with insecurity in national imagination.

Yet 2025 finds transformation underway. Pastoralists are organizing into cooperatives—the Garissa Butchers Co-operative demonstrates how collective action can improve market access, credit availability, and policy engagement. Despite supplying 70% of Kenya's meat, pastoralism finally receives government attention: pilot camel milk and meat value chains, supported by Mercy Corps and USAID, now export to Saudi Arabia. Sedentarization increases as families seek healthcare and education access.

The county exhibits classic pastoral transition complicated by insecurity: communities adapting to markets and services while managing drought, conflict, and cross-border dynamics with Somalia. By 2026, whether cooperative models scale and security stabilizes will determine if Garissa transitions toward prosperity—or remains trapped between traditional pastoralism and modern marginalization.