The Global Innovation Index 2019 ranks Kenya as the second most innovative country in Sub Saharan Africa, shortly below South Africa. The country ranks high among some of the most innovation achievers in Sub Saharan Africa for at least three times in a row. Kenya has a track record for recording high levels of innovation, outperforming on levels of innovation relative to GDP for the ninth consecutive year, an excellent record at per with other lower-middle-income countries like India, and Viet Nam.
Kenya’s position owes to its approach towards healthcare innovation, mainly leveraging on public-private partnerships that have brought immense benefits. While the country registers a high input rank, mainly innovation inputs such as its business, regulatory and political environment, Kenya needs to improve its innovation performance on creative, technology, business sophistication, and human capital output. Some of the nation’s innovative strengths include access to credit, especially microfinance gross loans where it ranks 6th in the world. Weaknesses include ICT services imports, pupil-teacher ratio, and trade tariff rates.
At a global level, Kenya is placed at 77th whereas neighbouring countries like Tanzania and Uganda take position 97 and 102 respectively. Switzerland remains the world’s leader in innovation in 2019 for the ninth consecutive year, followed by Sweden at second and the United States at third.
