Blog post by Joljol Yahya, a postgraduate student pursuing masters in Development Studies at the Catholic University of Eastern Africa (CUEA), in Nairobi, Kenya. He is a refugee, researcher and advocate, living in Kakuma Refugee Camp, for more than a decade.
Humanitarian aid for refugees living in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement has always been a blanket assistance model, where all refugees received uniform support regardless of their needs or vulnerabilities. In response to global humanitarian budget cuts and growing push for refugee self-reliance, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in collaboration with World Food Programme (WFP) have introduced Differentiated Assistance Model targeting refugees based on their vulnerability levels. In doing so they have grouped refugees into four categories, where categories 1 and 2 both receive food rations and cash assistance, whereas 3 and 4 receive other forms of support. This article critically examines the implementation of Differentiated Assistance Model for refugees in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei both of which are in Turkana County, in Northern Kenya. It highlights the flaws of this approach to promote inclusion, strengthen livelihoods, and reduce aid dependency as a response to global budget cuts, while also exposing challenges related to fairness and transparency. The analysis argues that for differentiated assistance to be an effective alternative to a blanket aid model, it must fully and accurately capture refugees’ vulnerability levels while addressing challenges associated with refugees’ economic integration.
Introduction
Kakuma Refugee Camp and the Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement both of which are located in Turkana County, northern Kenya, together host over 306,963 refugees and asylum seekers, making them one of the largest and longest standing refugee hosing camps in Africa. In 2025, humanitarian actors have shifted from a blanket assistance model, where all refugees received food and cash assistance based on family size, to a new Differentiated Assistance Model introduced by UNHCR and WFP. This model seeks to categorize refugees according to levels of self-reliance and vulnerability, and with aid allocated accordingly (WFP Kenya Country Brief, March 2025, 2025).
According to UNHCR and WFP, the rationale behind introducing Differentiated Assistance Model is that humanitarian budgets are shrinking globally, while policymakers and agencies are promoting refugee self-reliance under frameworks like the Kalobeyei Integrated Socio-Economic Development Plan (KISEDP) and the Shirika Plan. Differentiated assistance is thus presented as both a pragmatic and progressive step towards refugee self-reliance. However, the lived realties in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement reveal a more complex picture. For many refugees, being categorized as “partially” or “fully” self-reliant means losing access to much needed food or cash support, even though livelihood opportunities such as employment remain limited and are done on incentive basis, where refugees do not receive the same salary as a Kenyan national for the same work. The result is a system that risks deepening exclusion under the guise of efficiency or lack of funding from the Global North.
This article critically examines the Differentiated Assistance Model in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement. It argues that while aid to those most vulnerable may seem equitable, without fully and accurately capturing vulnerability levels of all refugees, it undermines refugee protection and risks worsening the already dire humanitarian situations in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement. Drawing on both academic insights and advocacy perspectives, the article explores how refugees’ participation in policy making, accountability, and fairness must be integrated throughout this new model to ensure that no refugee is left behind.
Background: From Blanket Aid to Differentiated Assistance Model
For decades, refugees both in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement were provided with food rations and non-food assistance under what is referred to as the blanket aid model. In this traditional approach, regardless of their livelihood conditions or socio-economic vulnerabilities, refugees received food portions based on the family household size (WFP, 2022). While this ensured a basic level of equity and coverage, the Differentiated Assistance Model introduced at both Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement in June 2025 didn’t fully and accurately capture different vulnerability levels of refugees. Refugee households with better living conditions were treated as those facing extreme vulnerability. Conversely, many refugees with extreme vulnerabilities were treated or put into 3 and 4 categories which meant that they will not receive any humanitarian support despite their desperate conditions.
Recognizing challenges associated with the diminishing global donor funding , humanitarian agencies, led by the World Food Programme (WFP) and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), have introduced a Differentiated Assistance Model. Under this system, refugees are categorized into four tiers based on their assessed levels of vulnerability and self-reliance. Those considered extremely vulnerable continue to receive full rations, while households identified as “partially” or “fully” self-reliant receive reduced or no assistance at all (UNHCR & WFP, 2021). According to UNHCR and WFP, this categorization aims to target resources more effectively, reduce dependency, and encourage pathways toward self-reliance.
As both UNHCR and WFP emphasise, several interlinked factors have driven this policy shift. First, shrinking humanitarian budgets have made it increasingly unsustainable to maintain uniform support for refugee populations (WFP, 2025). Second, there has been a deliberate push to integrate refugees into local development frameworks, particularly through Kalobeyei Integrated Socio-Economic Development Plan (KISEDP) and Shirika Plan. These frameworks emphasize the role of self-reliance, livelihood opportunities, and shared service delivery between refugee and host community (UNHCR & Kenya Government, 2018, 2023). Third, differentiated assistance aligns with global commitments such as the Global compact on Refugees (2018), which encourages more sustainable and development-oriented responses.
In this sense, the shift from blanket aid to differentiated assistance reflects not only a response to financial constraints but also a strategic rethinking of refugee support. However, the differentiated assistance does not fully consider varying levels of vulnerabilities or reliance and therefore fails to ensure assistance will be equitable and transformative in the long run.
Refugee Categorization: Who Gains and Who Loses?
Upon hearing the news that not all refugees will receive aid, refugees both in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement initially resisted the idea of categorization and took to the streets to demand that blanket aid assistance be reinstated to ensure everyone receives food rations and cash assistance. However, after a series of negotiations between the UNHCR and WFP on one hand, and refugee community leaders on other hand, differentiated assistance was given a chance to proceed as planned.
Since the introduction of the Differentiated Assistance Model in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement, many refugees are currently struggling to cope with reduced support as food rations and cash assistance are now provided based on vulnerability classification rather than a universal provision. According to an AP News report, the policy’s impact on refugees, mainly on those of category 3 and 4, has been so severe that about 6,000 refugees have left the camp, highlighting the model’s unintended role in deepening hardships rather than fostering resilience.
The shift to differentiated assistance in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement is premised on the categorization of refugees based on their different levels of vulnerability and self-reliance. Under this model, category 1 households are those identified as most vulnerable, including elderly headed households, persons with disabilities, and those with no access to income generating activities, and continue to receive to food rations. Those households whose vulnerability levels are not as extreme as category 1 are referred to as category 2 and continue to receive a reduced amount of food rations. Households “partially” self-reliant are in category 3, food rations are withdrawn from them. Whereas “fully” self-reliant households which fall in category 4 will not receive food rations or any humanitarian assistance at all. According to UNHCR and WFP, categories 3 and 4 include households with access to income generating activities such as having established business or have employment elsewhere (UNHCR & WFP, 2021).
While the Differentiated Assistance Model is touted by UNHCR and WFP as more equitable and one that uses limited resources more efficiently amid cuts in global donor funding, it raises important questions about the reliability of self-reliance assessments in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement. Both Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement remain highly restricted camps where opportunities for income generation are scarce or non-existent, often limited to informal markets, small scale entrepreneurship, or casual labour in the host community (Betts, 2019). Kakuma Refugee Camp receives little or no rain annually, limiting subsistence agriculture. The assumption that partial self-reliance is sustainable in refugee camps like Kakuma Refugee Camp, may therefore have been overstated. In such contexts, differentiated assistance may not effectively promote refugee self-reliance since agricultural livelihoods cannot be sustained.
A central concern lies in the risk of misclassification. Refugees who are categorized as “self-reliant” may still be highly vulnerable to shocks, such as loss of income generating source or sudden illness, given that there are not well functioning healthcare systems in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement (Betts, 2019). If these households are left out entirely, they will face heightened risks of food insecurity and deepening poverty (WFP, 2025). Misclassification of refugees not only undermines the intended efficiency of differentiated assistance but also creates tensions and perceptions of unfairness within refugee community (Hall, 2021). Furthermore, the majority of refugees in each category in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement raised concerns that categorizations process highlights a paradox. While the differentiated assistance model aims to encourage resilience, it inadvertently penalizes all these refugees due to its failure to fully and accurately capture realities of different levels of refugee’s vulnerability, and takes away the very safety nets that support their fragile progress. This raise an important policy question: How can humanitarian actors balance resource targeting with safeguards that prevent vulnerable refugee households from slipping deeper into crisis?
Refugee Voices and Participation in Policy Making
One of the biggest concerns surrounding the introduction of differentiated assistance in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement is the limited involvement of refugee in the making of this model. Empirical evidence suggests that most refugees in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement were consulted only after the framework had already been designed rather than being engaged from the start of its development (Hall, 2021). This lack of early participation has significant implications for perceptions of fairness and trust in humanitarian agencies in refugee contexts.
For many refugee households, the new categorization system has sparked insecurity within the refugee community due to lack of food for some households. Refugees in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement often report attacks by fellow hungry refugees, who have been placed in categories 3 and 4 whose assistance has been withdrawn to due to their assumed ability to sustain their households (Betts, 2019). Overwhelmingly, refugee households in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated settlement continue to raise concerns of uncertainty about the criteria used to determine their “vulnerability” and “self-reliance”, and that some families may be unfairly excluded from life sustaining support. Such perceptions have already started weakening refugee social cohesion which undermines the legitimacy of humanitarian programming (UNHCR & WFP, 2021).
Beyond immediate perceptions, the absence of structured refugee participation in policy making that affects them, reflects a bigger challenge in humanitarian governance, especially in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement. While frameworks such as the Comprehensive Refugee Response Framework (CRRF) emphasize accountability to affected populations, in practice, refugee voices remain excluded from decision making (Dryden-Peterson, S., Adelman, E., Bellino, M. J., & Chopra, V, 2019). This disconnect risks reinforcing power asymmetries between humanitarian agencies and refugees, positioning the latter as passive recipients rather than active stakeholders.
A more inclusive approach would ensure that refugees are not only consulted but actively involved in the design, monitoring, and adjustment of the assistance models. Strong participation of refugees in policy making could help build trust, enhance program legitimacy, and align aid with the live realities of the displaced populations (UNHCR, 2018). At the end, it is important to agree that sustainability and fairness of differentiated assistance depend on shifting from top-down aid models to approaches that recognize refugees as co-creators of the policies that impact, and shape not only lives and their futures.
Risks and Challenges of Differentiated Assistance Model for Refugees in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement
1. Exclusion and Vulnerability
Differentiated Assistance (DA), or the stratification of humanitarian aid based on a refugee household’s perceived self-reliance, often results in abrupt and severe exclusion of some refugees. In Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement, for example, households labelled as “partially self-reliant” or “fully self-reliant” (Category 3 and 4) have had food assistance withdrawn entirely leaving them without basic sustenance in a context where alternative income opportunities are scare or non-existent. Critically, the promised livelihood support for these refugee categories remains vague and unfulfilled, leaving affected refugees in limbo and at risk of slipping deeper into poverty (Nadeum, 2025).
Along the same lines, funding cuts have already started impacting not only the general refugee population but also children, pregnant, and breastfeeding women. Many of the refugee children in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement now face malnutrition, poor healthcare at hospitals, and even fatalities, according to AP News report. Thus, differentiated assistance risks intensifying existing humanitarian distress rather than carefully calibrating support.
2. Tension within Refugee Communities in Kakuma Refugee Camp
Differentiated Assistance has already created tensions among refugees in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement. Since the Differentiated Assistance Model was introduced in June, theft and assaults among refugees have increased. Refugees under the category 3 and 4 and have protested this policy and burned down a food distribution centre in Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement. As a result, unconfirmed number of refugees have been killed while others were injured when Kenya police intervened to contain the protest of the hungry refugees. In the months of June and July, tensions in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement, were high. As result, schools and humanitarian agencies had to close their offices temporarily. Consequently, Department of Refugee Service in collaboration with Kenya Police declared a curfew for weeks in both camps before it was eventually lifted when the situation returned to normal.
3. Accountability and Transparency Concerns
Transparency and participatory governance are essential to equitable aid provision in refugee contexts. However, in Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement, the Differentiated Assistance Framework was largely conceived behind closed doors, with refugees only “consulted” after decisions had already been made. Participation of refugees in the design of this policy was largely tokenised rather than substantive (Hydrogene, 2025). In addition to this, problems with data collection and categorization have resulted in misclassification of refugees, risking denial of essential aid to wrongly categorized households according to the report in The Standard. Without robust systems, the allocation of assistance becomes unfair and potentially discriminatory, with no alternative for the category 3 and 4 to appeal the decision.
4. Appeal Mechanisms
Reliable grievance and appeal mechanisms are essential for smooth implementation of Differentiated Assistance. There are proper and timely channels where complaints of misclassification or grievances can be raised in Kakuma Refugee Camp. However, the situation on the ground is dire as there are no structured, accessible, or time-sensitive mechanisms through which refugees can appeal for wrong classification or categorization. As a refugee myself, and affected by this categorization, it remains difficult for me to file for a complaint of misclassification as I am unemployed and do not have any source of income in Kakuma Refugee camp. What this means is that, in effect, vulnerable refugees are silenced amid suffering.
The Bigger Picture: Kenya’s Refugee Strategy
Kenya’s refugee policy has been evolving from short term humanitarian relief to long term development and inclusion. Two central frameworks illustrate this shift. The Kalobeyei Integrated Socio-Economic Development Plan (KISEDP) and the Shrika Plan. KISEDP, implemented in Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement, focuses on promoting self-reliance by linking refugee and host communities through shared services, livelihood opportunities, and development interventions. Its aim is to reduce refugees’ dependency on humanitarian aid and promote sustainability by ensuring services are provided and accessible to both refugees and the local Turkana community.
Building on this promise, the Shirika Plan, introduced by Kenyan Government in 2025, represents a more ambitious, government led strategy that seeks to transform Kakuma Refugee Camp and Dadaab Camp into formal municipalities managed by local counties. By doing so, it means that refugees can be integrated into national health, education, and financial systems. The plan moves away from parallel humanitarian structures toward inclusion within Kenya’s broader development agenda. It also seeks to align with the Refugee Act of 2021 and national development frameworks, marking a major policy shift toward treating refugees as active participants in Kenya’s social and economic life.
Despite these advances, challenges still remain between differentiated assistance and the broader inclusion goals of KISEDP and Shirika Plan. The Differentiated Assistance Model categorises refugees based on their perceived vulnerability which often lacks accuracy, leading to exclusion, fragmentation, and dependency on wrong classification systems. These short term mechanisms contrast with the long-term vision of equal access and integration outlined in the Shirika Plan., According to the report by The New Humanitarian, without reconciling these approaches, there is a risk that differentiated assistance will undermine Kenya’s broader inclusion agenda.
In sum, Kenya’s refugee policy is at a crossroads. While KISEDP and Shirika Plan provide progressive models for refugee self-reliance and integration, the Differentiated Assistance Model has contradictions that could perhaps slow down or complicate their implementation. The success of Kenya’s refugee policy will depend on bridging this gap to ensure that immediate assistance does not erode, but rather complements, the country’s long-term goals of sustainable refugee inclusion.
Towards a Fairer Differentiated Assistance Model
To bridge the gap between short term humanitarian aid and long-term inclusion objectives, a phased transition toward self-reliance is needed. Differentiated Assistance Model, should, first of all, begin with maintaining baseline support while gradually introducing economic empowerment programs, such as adjusting refugee employment policies from incentive workers to fully paid workers, provide business training, and microfinance opportunities. Examples from Kakuma Refugee Camp show that refugee entrepreneurs who received financial training and access to market loans were able to grow successful business. This highlights how livelihood focused support can build refugees’ self-reliance effectively as reported by The AP.
It is also important that regular reassessments of households are conducted, supplemented by genuine refugee participation in policy making. This ensures that refugees have real participation in designing assessment tools and identifying priorities, helping avoid misclassification of refugee households into wrong categories. In Kakuma Refugee Camp and Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement, critics of the Differentiated Assistance Model, have pointed out that consultations with refugees were made only after the policy had been developed. According to Refugees International (2023) involving refugees in developing policies that directly impact them, especially through Refugee Led Organization (RLOS), is essential to contextualized, responsive programming.
Finally, Differentiated Assistance Model must be reviewed to ensure that refugees wrongly classified as “partially” or “fully” self-reliant are reclassified while also conducting regular reassessment of refugee households’ vulnerability levels. At the same time, robust grievance mechanisms can provide clear and timely pathway for misclassified refugees to appeal decisions, with the possibility of escalation where necessary. Integrating refugees within Kenya’s national safety nets would further enhance consistency and sustainability. When policies are designed with participatory monitoring, such policies do not only protect livelihoods but also strengthen accountability and local ownership, therefore achieving refugees’ inclusion as stipulated by Shirika Plan.
Conclusion
Differentiated Assistance Model, presented by UNHCR and WFP as a response to reduced funding, carries within it the risks of deepening exclusion and reinforcing vulnerabilities if not carefully reevaluated and implemented. The fact that Differentiated Assistance Model targets refugees based on vulnerability levels should not overshadow their protection needs and lived realities, especially those misclassified as “partially” or “fully” self-reliant, or left without adequate support (Dryden-Peterson, S., Adelman, E., Bellino, M. J., & Chopra, V, 2019).
A more inclusive Differentiated Assistance Model is required, one that upholds the principles of self-reliance while ensuring that refugees are not pushed further into cycles of poverty. Adopting effective refugee participation in any policy making that directly has implications for their lives and future, regular reassessment, and transparent grievance channels can both strengthen community trust and improve accountability (Hall, 2021).
Aid models should go beyond categorization of refugees to prioritise refugee dignity, equity, and protection. As Kenya advances with its broader refugee inclusion strategies such as the Shirika Plan, it is important for UNHCR and its partners to ensure that humanitarian assistance frameworks reflect these values not just as a matter of policy coherence, but as a matter of justice and humanity (UNHCR & Kenya Government, 2018, 2023)
References
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Dryden-Peterson, S., Adelman, E., Bellino, M. J., & Chopra, V. (2019). he Purposes of Refugee Education: Policy and Practice of Including Refugees in National Education Systems. From www.reach.gse.harvard.edu: https://www.reach.gse.harvard.edu/academic-research-publications?
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UNHCR. (2018). Kalobeyei Integrated Socio-Economic Development Plan (KISEDP). From /www.unhcr.org: https://www.unhcr.org/ke/about-us/where-we-work/kalobeyei-settlement?
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