Welcome to the Embassy of Sweden in Nairobi

The Embassy has personnel posted from the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) as well as locally recruited staff. As of July 2011 there are approximately 60 persons, of whom 20 are sent out staff, working in Nairobi. The Embassy is the largest Swedish Embassy in Africa and third largest mission in the Swedish foreign service.

Policy Areas and Activities
Sweden’s Policy for Global Development calls for all policy areas to work in a coherent way towards the central goal of contributing to an equitable and sustainable global development. This policy was further developed in the Government’s Africa Policy. The Embassy in Nairobi is quite unique in its variety of policy areas and activities. This creates a work environment with plenty of opportunities to ensure coherence as well as to utilize and benefit from synergies.

• Ambassador 
• General section: Political; Trade and Commercial; UN Affairs; Press, Information and Culture
• Kenya: Development Cooperation
• Somalia: Political and Development Cooperation
• Regional Development Cooperation (REED)
• Administration
  - Migration and Consular Affairs

The Embassy represents and advances Swedish policies, interests and values in political and economic relations, development cooperation, in trade and investment promotion and in cultural and information matters. It provides consular services to Swedish nationals and migration services to non-nationals. The Embassy assists a large number of visiting delegations.
The Embassy acts bilaterally, through the European Union (EU) as well as within the United Nations (UN).  The objective is to provide services of high standard in all areas of activity.

Development cooperation is a major responsibility for the Embassy. Swedish global aid volumes reached SEK 31,4 billion (USD 5 billion) in 2010, which is 1% of GNI. This resulted in Sweden being top ranked among countries providing development assistance in the world.

The overall goal of Swedish development cooperation is to help create conditions that will enable the poor to improve their lives. The assistance is based on a human rights perspective and the perspective of the poor. Sweden is strongly committed to the UN Millennium Declaration and the Millennium Development Goals as well as the Paris Declaration and the Accra Agenda for Action to promote donor harmonisation, alignment and cooperation. The Embassy works towards efficient use of development and humanitarian assistance.

Projected volumes for development cooperation in 2011, including planned humanitarian assistance, attached to the Embassy of Sweden in Nairobi and Kigali