Kericho County is one of the 47 counties in Kenya. The county seats between longitude 35°02' and 35°40' East and between the equator and latitude 0°23' South with an altitude of about 2002m above sea level. It borders Uasin Gishu County to the North, Baringo County to the North-East, Nandi County to the North-West, Nakuru County to the East and Bomet County to the South, Kisumu County to the Northwest and Nyamira County to the West. It had a population of 901,777 (2019 census) and an area of 2,111 km².[2][3] Its capital and largest town is Kericho.
Kericho County is home to the largest Kenyan tea plantations. Some of the largest tea companies including Unilever Kenya, James Finlay and Williamson Tea are based here. It is also home to the popular Ketepa brand.
The defunct Buret District is now part of Kericho County.
Physical and topical features
County slopes gently from 2500m to about 1,800m above the sea level. The county is surrounded by a number of hills such as Tinderet Hills to the North, Mau Escarpment and Londiani hills (Tuluap-Kipsigis). A good number of rivers emanate from the county including Chemosit, Kiptaret, Kipsonoi, Timbilil, Maramara, Itare, Nyando, Kipchorian and Malaget.[3]
Climatic conditions
County has a temperature range between 10C - 29C and rainfall of 2,125mm p.a being highest in central part of county where they plant tea and 1,400 mm p.a. in lower parts of Soin and parts of Kipkelion. County has rainy seasons April to June and October to December.[4]
Demographics
Kericho county has a total population of 901,777 of which 450,741 are males, 451,008 females and 28 intersex persons. There are 206,036 household with an average household size of 4.4 persons per household and a population density 370 people per square kilometre.[5]
The county hosts 25 trading centres, 5,813 registered businesses, 5807 licensed retail traders and 5,740 licensed wholesale traders.[26] In 2022, the county produced 432 million kilos of tea.[27] The acquisition of these lands has long been controversial, particularly as it relates to the eviction of Kipsigis and Talai people from their land by British forces when Kenya was a British colony. The United Nations has criticised the British government for not providing "effective remedies and reparation" for colonial-era crimes,[28] with representatives for these communities attempting to sue the British government through the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).[29]
There are a number of industries in Kericho such as cement industry (Rai Cement Limited) and steel industry (Prime Steel Limited), Soin Sugar Company all three of them located in Soin ward, 18 tea processing factories, in various sub-counties, dairy processing plants in various sub-counties and Kipkelion District coffee union process coffee in Fort Ternan, Kipkelion Sub-county.[3] The use of tea plucking machines has been controversial in the area, leading to acts of industrial sabotage by disaffected youths.[30]
Education
There are 1054 ECD centres 803 primary schools and 229 secondary schools. The county has also 1 teachers training colleges, 6 Youth Polytechnics, 80 adult training institutions and 6 technical training institutions.[4]
There are a total of 136 health facilities in the county with one county referral hospital. County has 2,084 health personnel of different cadre. The immunisation coverage is at 61% and still below the national target of 90%.[3]
HIV prevalence is at 3.5% below the national 5.9% (Kenya HIV Estimates 2015).[32]
The county is covered by 1,110.7 km of road network. of this 411.1 km is covered by earth surface, 484.7 km is murram surface and 214.9 km is covered by bitumen.[34][35]
There are 8 Post Offices with 2,299 installed letter boxes, 2,079 rented letter boxes and 220 vacant letter boxes.[26]
