Ruto lists ambitious projects to turn his first-world country dream into reality
By Kenneth Mwenda, October 13, 2025President William Ruto has outlined an ambitious plan to transform Kenya from a developing nation into Africa’s “new Singapore,” listing energy expansion, irrigation, and infrastructure development as the country’s three top priorities.
Speaking during the launch of Phase One Infrastructure at Konza Technopolis in Makueni County, Ruto said Kenya must invest heavily in power generation, food security, and transport systems to achieve first-world status within a generation.
“This is the moment, this is the generation, and this is the opportunity for us to move this country to the next level,” he said. “We cannot remain a third-world country forever. We must raise the bar.”
Powering transformation
Ruto said the country’s current power capacity of 2,300 megawatts is insufficient to support growing industrial demand. He announced plans to generate an additional 10,000 megawatts within the next five to seven years, at a cost of about Ksh1 trillion.
“We do not have enough electricity to transform our nation,” he said. “Even as we bring more industries to places like Konza, Vipingo, and Nakuru, we must have sufficient energy to power our transformation.”
The president said the government will introduce a National Infrastructure Fund to pool resources from the national budget, private investors, and proceeds from privatisation to fund such large-scale projects.
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Reducing food imports
Ruto also pledged to end Kenya’s reliance on imported food, saying the country spends nearly Ksh500 billion annually on imports of rice, maize, wheat, and sugar.
“We have almost exhausted land under rain-fed agriculture. We now must move to irrigation,” he said. “We need to build 50 mega-dams like Thwake to irrigate two million acres.”
“As I talked to you, we are spending 500 billion shillings every year to import food into Kenya. Edible oil, wheat, rice, sugar, maize sometimes.”
“And we are doing, we are producing more maize, produced almost 25 million bags more last year. We are producing more tea. We are producing more coffee, better prices. But that is not enough. We need to stop importing food to Kenya. We need to save that 500 billion we are importing to Kenya.”
The president said irrigation will help stabilise food supply, create jobs, and allow Kenya to produce enough for export to international markets such as the EU, the U.S., and China, where Kenya has negotiated trade access.
Infrastructure for growth
The third pillar of Ruto’s plan focuses on expanding infrastructure. He said Kenya needs at least 1,000 kilometres of dual carriageway, improved railway lines, and new airport facilities to match global standards.
“We must build more infrastructure – roads, rail, and airports,” he said. “We need to stop small thinking. We cannot continue to operate with makeshift facilities at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport. We must build a proper airport for a modern economy.”
Ruto said these efforts, if implemented, would drive Kenya’s journey toward industrialisation and global competitiveness. He drew parallels with South Korea and Singapore, nations that were once at Kenya’s development level in the 1960s but have since become global economic leaders.