Kenya’s textile industry has long stood as a symbol of both promise and neglect.
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Once employing nearly 30 percent of the manufacturing workforce and supporting over 200,000 cotton-farming households, the sector has since withered under decades of underinvestment, policy inconsistency, and the influx of second-hand imports.
What was once a proud pillar of industrial employment and export earnings has been reduced to a patchwork of struggling mills, idle ginneries, and farmers who abandoned cotton for survival crops.
A story of decline
The liberalisation wave of the early 1990s opened Kenya’s market to global competition, but without the infrastructure or capacity to withstand it. Textile mills, unable to compete with cheap imports, shut their doors.
By the early 2000s, most large-scale garment manufacturers had either collapsed or were operating at less than 10 percent capacity. The result was devastating.
Factories that once produced millions of metres of fabric became ghost facilities dependent on government bailouts rather than production.
Cotton production plummeted from historic highs to below 10,000 MT annually, dismantling a once-integrated ecosystem of farmers, ginners, and processors.
As mills fell silent, the collapse cascaded down the value chain, farmers lost markets, gins rusted away, and rural economies stagnated.
A window of opportunity
Three decades later, a window for renewal has opened. Kenya’s Cotton, Textile, and Apparel (CTA) Policy 2024 sets out a clear roadmap for revitalization, emphasizing value-chain integration, private-sector partnerships, and incentives for modernisation.
Kenya currently imports about $2.2 billion worth of textiles annually, a paradox for a cotton-producing country. Local mills meet less than 45 percent of domestic fabric demand, representing a massive import-substitution opportunity.
If the policy is executed with discipline and focus, even partial import replacement could save the country hundreds of millions in foreign exchange, while exports could triple to $2 billion by 2030, up from $628 million in 2024.
The multiplier effects are substantial. A thriving textile ecosystem can rejuvenate cotton farming across 24 counties, re-engage 200,000 farmers, and catalyse thousands of indirect jobs in logistics, transport, and retail. This is particularly crucial in a nation where 17.7 percent of the youth remain unemployed.
At a household level, a predictable cotton market revives rural incomes, while at a national scale, the textile revival strengthens Kenya’s manufacturing share of GDP, reduces trade deficits, and expands export diversification under trade frameworks like Agoa, AfCFTA, and EBA.
A global shift Kenya can seize
Global supply chains are undergoing realignment. Rising labour costs in Asia, sustainability pressures, and shifting trade dynamics are prompting major brands to diversify sourcing to Africa.
Studies by Gherzi indicate that over 50 percent of Africa’s apparel demand is currently met through imports, a market valued at $74 billion in 2024, and projected to grow to $93 billion by 2030.
Kenya currently enjoys a 10 percent tariff advantage into the US compared to Asian exporters such as Bangladesh or Vietnam, following the latest Trump tariff directives but also benefits from the one-year Agoa extension, a structural edge that, if coupled with vertically integrated capacity, grants Kenya the opportunity to position itself as East Africa’s textile and apparel hub.
The road ahead
If implemented with discipline, this initiative will not only re-industrialize Kenya’s textile sector but reposition the country as a continental model for sustainable industrialisation, combining agriculture, manufacturing, and exports in one circular ecosystem.
From Rivatex’s factory floors in Eldoret to new knitwear lines in Vipingo, the rebirth of Kenyan textiles is more than an industrial project; it is a social and economic renaissance. It represents a shift from dependency to productivity, from importing to exporting, and from unemployment to empowerment.
The targets of 22,000 jobs, $514 million in annual output, $470 million in investment, and $2 billion in exports by 2030 are both bold and achievable.
With government as the enabler, and private enterprise as the driver, the revival of Kenya’s textile industry is no longer a distant ambition. It is a transformation already in motion.