Choosing Locations for Small Town Development to Enable Market and Employment Expansion: The Case of Kenya

Abstract

Kenya's Rural Trade and Production Center Program is designed to use small towns to stimulate market and employment expansion in areas of high unmet agricultural and livestock potential. The logic of the program is consistent with a formula-based method presented here. The method is intended to inform planners of locations for investments in small towns. Geographical techniques are used in this method to delimit market areas and define some of their characteristics. This methodology distinctly acknowledges the importance of rural-urban linkages in development decisions. The specific approaches to these location choices should be adaptable to other developing countries attempting to expand agricultural and employment markets.