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This report analysed financial flows for disaster risk finance (DFR) in Kenya, focusing on more anticipatory mechanisms at the earlier stages of the Disaster Risk Management (DRM) cycle, between disaster mitigation and resilience to early action and timely response. It is informed by a desk-based review of operational DRF mechanisms, combined with secondary data from the International Humanitarian UN OCHA’s Financial Tracking System (FTS) and manually collated data on the key DRF mechanisms identified through the review. The disaster risk management and risk financing architecture in Kenya has made significant progress since the 2008 to 2011 prolonged drought that affected 3.7 million people.1 However, current mechanisms still struggle to reach large numbers of people affected by multiple, often concurrent, and compounding hazard events.

Key findings include: 

• Even when you focus on ‘early phase’ financing within the DRM cycle, anticipatory financing receives a tiny minority of overall financial flows. More resources are still needed for anticipatory financing. 
• The vast majority of ‘early phase’ DRM funding is directed towards drought. However, this is not in proportion to the numbers of people affected by other crises - most notably flooding. Recent years have also shown a marked increase in concurrent and compounding hazards, such as drought coinciding with locust incursions, or followed shortly by other hazards like flooding. It is important that DRF mechanisms are developed to serve different hazard types, or can be used flexibly, and that flooding in particular is not overlooked as a hazard type. 
• The geographical coverage and reach of risk financing mechanisms is very uneven across counties in Kenya. For example, there are several ASAL counties which are not served by any of the main DRF mechanisms. Disaster management agencies should be conscious of the geographical distribution of DRF mechanisms and improve flows to under-served counties.