Kenya has launched its first comprehensive National Financial Inclusion Strategy (NFIS) 2025-2028, setting ambitious targets to close persistent gaps in access, usage, and quality of financial services.
- •The NFIS explicitly shifts focus from “access for access’s sake” to financial health, aiming to double the share of financially healthy adults to nearly 40% by 2028.
- •The strategy comes at a time when access to finance has expanded to 84.8% of adults, yet only 18.3% of Kenyans are financially healthy, down from 39.4% in 2016.
- •The NFIS, spearheaded by the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) and the National Treasury, sets out concrete goals, including raising insurance uptake from 15% to 50% and growing formal savings from 68% to 75%.
The 2024 FinAccess survey shows that although most adults can now transact digitally, many still struggle with resilience: fewer than one in four can raise an emergency lump sum within three days, and just 15% are saving for old age.
To cut household debt stress, the NFIS intends to enforce stronger creditworthiness checks and alternative scoring models, with a target of reducing over-indebtedness by 30%. For agriculture- the backbone of Kenya’s economy- the strategy aims to raise farmers’ access to formal credit from 43% to 60%, supported by crop insurance and digital value-chain financing.
Green finance will also feature prominently, with full adoption of the Kenya Green Finance Taxonomy and expansion of ESG-compliant products and carbon trading frameworks.
Persistent gender, rural-urban, and youth disparities remain central to the strategy. Women and young people, despite driving entrepreneurship and informal economies, remain disproportionately excluded due to lack of collateral, low financial literacy, and limited access to identification documents.
The NFIS proposes mobile ID registration units in rural areas, scaling women-friendly and disability-adapted products, and financial literacy campaigns in schools to address these gaps.
Unifying Efforts
Kenya’s celebrated fintech revolution has not yet translated into widespread financial well-being. Mobile money use has plateaued, with most users sticking to basic transfers rather than credit, insurance, or investment products.
For the first time, Kenya will have a unified national framework to coordinate efforts previously scattered across regulators, banks, fintechs, and development partners. A National Financial Inclusion Committee and Technical Coordination Council will oversee implementation, backed by data-driven monitoring and evaluation.
Stakeholder engagement has already been broad, with over 60 institutions consulted during its design, and lessons drawn from countries such as Tanzania, Nigeria, and Uganda that have already institutionalized national strategies.
If implemented effectively, the NFIS could be a turning point- ensuring that financial inclusion is not just about more accounts, but about improving livelihoods, building resilience, and enabling future investments.
As Treasury Cabinet Secretary John Mbadi put it during the launch, the strategy is “a call to action to create a vibrant, efficient, and inclusive financial system that benefits all Kenyans.”
