The Kakuma refugee camp was established in 1992 in response to the inflow of 23,000 Sudanese refugees (Jamal 2000). The camp is now home to over 100,000 refugees from South Sudan, Burundi, Ethiopia, Somalia, and the DRC (UNHCR, 2012). The ongoing unrest in South Sudan is likely to exacerbate the refugee situation in the upcoming year. Moreover, the restrictions imposed by the government on refugee movement and employment makes the Kakuma population completely dependent on assistance provided by international organizations present on the field (Jamal 2000) The evidence on the impact of refugees in Kenya is quite limited. However, the Nordic Agency for Development and Ecology (NORDECO 2010) provides a detailed description, backed by sound descriptive statistics, on the impact of Dadaab refugee camps on host communities. Despite the very different structure of the local economy, mainly driven by pastoralist livelihoods, a pattern somewhat similar to the Tanzanian case is observed. According to NORDECO (2010), the aggregated economic impact is positive. It is estimated that about USD 3 million annual income accrues to the host community thanks to livestock and milk sales to the refugee camps. Trade and employment opportunities have also been reported around Dadaab camps in Kenya. The total economic benefits, including through savings on food purchases (including through purchases from refugees), income accruing to local contractors from assignments for the United Nations or Non‐Governmental Organizations or support for host communities, “using 2010 as a reference year, are [estimated to be] around USD 14 million annually. On a per capita basis this equates to around 25% of average annual per capita income in North Eastern province”. This estimation corresponds to a back‐on‐the‐envelope approximation but it gives a sense of the major benefits to the local population. Similar to the Tanzanian case, the presence of the Dadaab refugee camps is reported to have improved the provision of local public goods such as the frequency and reach of transport services and the availability of health and social services. NORDECO also observed environmental degradation around the Dadaab camps<sup>5</sup> but spatially restricted in an area of inherently low resource value. It seems that environmental support programs have helped limiting the collection of firewood by refugees and providing alternative fuel sources (Milner and Loescher 2004).

Compared to the Tanzanian case, two main differences emerge. Less emphasis is given to the distributional effect of the refugee inflows on the hosting communities, while less pressure on prices is observed around the Dadaab refugee camps. Both differences may actually be related to the dominance of pastoralist livelihoods. First, on the distributional dimension, NORDECO (2010) did not point to a similar substitution effect between unskilled labor or refugees. In a pastoralist environment, the low‐ middle‐income group and the poor are those primarily engaged in selling their products to refugee camps. Second, contrary to Alix‐Garcia and Saah (2010) for Tanzania, “the price of basic commodities such as maize, rice, wheat, sugar and cooking oil is [reported to be] at least 20% lower in camps than in other towns in arid and semi‐arid parts of Kenya. The main reasons are the re‐sale of WFP [World Food Program] rations, access to free food by locals registered as refugees and illegal imports via Somalia” (NORDECO 2010: 9). Another possible explanation reported by Maystadt and Duranton (2014) in the Tanzanian case, is the importance of transport services in pushing the price of traded goods down. Although focusing more on the urban function of the refugee camps and the social transformation underpinned in the hosting society, Jansen (2011) also reports similar trading activities and wealth 5 Nonetheless, such a degradation is acknowledged by NORDECO (2010) to be difficult to distinguish from general trend prevailing the region.

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