diff --git a/meta/classes/kernel.bbclass b/meta/classes/kernel.bbclass
index e0b752de19..2d219cb5e5 100644
--- a/meta/classes/kernel.bbclass
+++ b/meta/classes/kernel.bbclass
@@ -326,6 +326,13 @@ KERNEL_DEBUG_TIMESTAMPS ??= "0"
 
 kernel_do_compile() {
 	unset CFLAGS CPPFLAGS CXXFLAGS LDFLAGS MACHINE
+
+	# setup native pkg-config variables (kconfig scripts call pkg-config directly, cannot generically be overriden to pkg-config-native)
+	export PKG_CONFIG_DIR="${STAGING_DIR_NATIVE}${libdir_native}/pkgconfig"
+	export PKG_CONFIG_PATH="$PKG_CONFIG_DIR:${STAGING_DATADIR_NATIVE}/pkgconfig"
+	export PKG_CONFIG_LIBDIR="$PKG_CONFIG_DIR"
+	export PKG_CONFIG_SYSROOT_DIR=""
+
 	if [ "${KERNEL_DEBUG_TIMESTAMPS}" != "1" ]; then
 		# kernel sources do not use do_unpack, so SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH may not
 		# be set....