Welcome focus on climate action but lots more must happen

The generally dry, wind-swept, dusty and water-starved Makueni County was the perfect backdrop for the 7th Devolution Conference that ended on Friday under the theme ‘Multi-level Governance for Climate Action’, and which devoted reflections on the climate change catastrophe under a sub-theme titled ‘Sub-national Mobilization in Unlocking the Full Potential of Climate Action during and after Pandemics’.

It was also a timely convocation coming after the drawn-out global climate conference held in Glasgow last month under the Conference of Parties (COP) series, this being the 26th. The theme and timing of the Makueni conference may have been coincidental but it is a happy coincidence given the clear and present danger we all confront if global warming is not mitigated by unrelenting action and investment.

The fact that the $100 billion pledged by rich countries in Copenhagen in 2003 during the COP15 to support mitigation efforts around the world has yet to be reached remains a big embarrassment and an enduring symbol of the disjointed global response to this danger that, paradoxically, all agree needs to be tackled.

Chief polluters 

But as the chief environmental polluters – US and China in particular – dither and bicker over the funding approach and who should take greater responsibility, Kenya and other countries must continue with their own journey to heal their immediate environments.

Many have tried to translate into action the important decisions in the Paris Agreement signed by nearly all the members during the COP21. The standout commitment was to keep the rise in the global average temperature to ‘well below’ two degrees above pre-industrial levels, ideally 1.5 degrees; strengthen the ability to adapt to climate change and build resilience; and align all finance flows with ‘a pathway towards low greenhouse gas emissions and climate-resilient development’.

This objective is becoming increasingly difficult to achieve because that would require that global emissions must halve by 2030 and reach ‘net-zero’ by 2050. Given the inability (or unwillingness) of the rich countries to mobilise $100 billion (a puny figure compared to the colossal amounts mobilised to confront the Covid-19 pandemic) towards this effort, only unprecedented action at the global stage holds out any hope.

Kenya should not wait for this miracle. It has set targets it is shooting to meet under the COP Nationally Determined Contribution framework and requires about $62 billion, out of which it hopes to mobilise 13 per cent locally and the balance of 87 per cent from international contributions. If it mobilised the full commitment, it hopes to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 32 per cent by 2030.

It is perfectly in order to live in hope and sustain efforts to mobilise the 87 per cent deficit in the budget, but it is more realistic to stretch the available 32 per cent and ensure its potential returns are fully realised. The frameworks to roll out the climate action campaigns are already in place. They include the National Climate Change Policy and the National Climate Finance Policy passed in 2018. We also have the National Climate Change Action Plan that runs from 2018 to 2022 at a cost of Sh1.8 trillion.

In 2019, the national strategy to achieve and maintain a 10 per cent tree cover by 2022 was launched and was expected to cost Sh48 billion, although we do not hear much of what is happening in this ambitious plan that we have spoken about in these pages before.

These strategies should trigger programmes and projects that can achieve considerable success but only if all Kenyans are mobilised and motivated to come on board. Counties are particularly well suited to embrace these and mainstream them in their project implementation through at least one of the critical developed functions – agriculture.

Extension systems

Our smallholder farmers contribute massively to land degradation through agricultural practices that are harmful. Many do this unwittingly because of ignorance and often, lack of access to inputs that can help. County leaderships must invest massively in reviving and sustaining robust extension systems through which farmers are mobilised as entry points for climate action initiatives.

They need to be exposed to and encouraged to deploy regenerative and climate-smart agricultural technologies such as minimum tillage, cover cropping, intercropping, crop rotation, composting, use of organic mulch, agro-forestry, the use of stress and drought-tolerant crop varieties and seeds, and soil and water conservation technologies such as terraces and basins.

If implemented diligently under the existing national and sub-national strategies and frameworks, such extension support systems that are directly under our control will breathe welcome life into outcomes from meetings such as the Makueni conference.

The writer is a former editor-in-chief of Nation Media Group and is now consulting. [email protected], @tmshindi