COMPLETED PROJECT · 2025

Inclusive Food Security
in Semi-Arid Areas

Supporting vulnerable households and people with disabilities to strengthen food security, livelihoods and resilience in semi-arid communities.

Combining inclusive agriculture, savings, household food production and community resilience.

PROJECT PERIOD2025

LOCATIONMeru County, Kenya

FOCUSFood security · Resilience · Livelihoods

When climate and poverty combine, a difficult season can quickly become a household crisis.

People with disabilities may face additional barriers to accessing agricultural resources, financial services, information and opportunities to participate in local development.

IFSA responded by focusing on practical, inclusive approaches that could help households produce food, diversify livelihoods and strengthen their ability to cope with future shocks.

THE APPROACH

Making food security more inclusive and resilient.

The project brought together agricultural production, household food gardens, savings and livelihood activities while ensuring that people with disabilities could participate.

Resilient agriculture

Households were supported with approaches and practices suited to areas facing water and climate challenges.

Kitchen gardens

Household gardens provided practical opportunities to grow vegetables and improve access to nutritious food.

Savings & livelihoods

Savings and livelihood activities helped households build financial resilience and create additional income opportunities.

Disability inclusion

The project worked to ensure people with disabilities were included in food security and livelihood opportunities.

WHAT CHANGED

Strengthening household resilience.

The project focused on practical household-level changes that could continue supporting food security and resilience beyond the immediate intervention.

500

women-headed households and women with disabilities were targeted through the project.

farm ponds were established to improve access to water for household production.

600

households were targeted for improved food production through resilient agricultural practices.

SILC

savings and lending mechanisms provided households with a pathway towards financial resilience.

500

women-headed households and women with disabilities were reached through targeted project support.

integrated approach connected food production, livelihoods, savings and disability inclusion.

The figures above reflect project targets and reported interventions. Where a final production figure was not available, the page does not present the target as a measured final outcome.

Agriculture and household food production

WATER & FOOD PRODUCTION

Making every drop work harder.

Water availability is one of the major challenges facing farming households in semi-arid areas.

The project supported the establishment of 35 farm ponds to improve household access to water for small-scale agricultural production.

Experience from the project showed that household-level ponds were more practical than relying on shared ponds, while some neighbours could still benefit from available water.

LIVESTOCK & HOUSEHOLD ASSETS

Support was adapted to different household realities.

The project included livestock and small-animal support as part of its livelihood approach.

Rabbits were added for households that could not keep chickens or goats, allowing the intervention to respond more flexibly to different living conditions.

This flexibility was important because a livelihood option that works for one household may not be practical for another.

WOMEN & DISABILITY INCLUSION

Putting women with disabilities at the centre of resilience.

Women-headed households and women with disabilities were a central target group for the project.

Targeting was deliberately undertaken so that the intended 500 women-headed households and women with disabilities could be reached.

The project recognised that strengthening women's access to productive resources, savings and food production can have wider benefits for household wellbeing.

500women-headed households and women with disabilities targeted

SAVINGS & LIVELIHOODS

Resilience is also about having somewhere to turn.

Savings and Internal Lending Communities provided a local financial mechanism through which members could save together and access loans.

Regular savings

Members contributed savings regularly, building a collective pool of resources.

Access to loans

Members could borrow from their groups to support productive and household needs.

Income generation

Loans could be invested in small businesses and other livelihood activities.

Collective resilience

Groups created a local support structure that could help members respond to economic pressures.

WHAT WE LEARNED

Inclusive resilience must be practical.

The project demonstrated the importance of adapting food security interventions to the realities of individual households.

Farm ponds were most practical when designed around individual households rather than assuming that shared ponds would work equally well for everyone.

Similarly, livestock support needed to account for the household's ability to keep different animals, which is why rabbits provided an alternative for some beneficiaries.

These lessons reinforce DOMSPARK's wider approach: inclusion works best when people are not simply given the same thing, but are supported according to their circumstances and needs.

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