Waiguru to address 27th UN Conference on climate in Egypt

The Council of Governors (CoG) Chairperson Anne Waiguru, is set to address the 27th UN Conference on climate in Egypt.

The conference scheduled for Thursday has brought together parties to the UN Climate agreement of 1992 and will be moderated by Chatham House.

Ms Waiguru, who is also the Kirinyaga Governor, will address a session on climate action in a changing world, assessing the vital role of states and regions.

The session will examine multi-level action where subnational and international actors can work together to drive climate progress faster, and respond to a rapidly changing world.

In a statement availed to the Nation.Africa by the county communication office, Ms Waiguru said the conference  aims at sharing updates on the progress of state, regional and devolved governments towards mitigation and adaption since the last conference.

Global warming

It is also supposed to underline the important role of all levels of governments in global climate processes and present key recommendations and scalable solutions on how to further accelerate progress and regionalize climate commitments.

Governor Waiguru is expected to highlight how the international community can support states and regions to speed up their efforts in fighting global warming.

The governor will give insights on various actions the national government and the 47 counties are taking towards mitigating against climate change.

Ms Waiguru said county governments, last year, undertook to mitigate the effects of climate change by growing over 10 million trees.  They have also undertaken various initiatives towards reversing ecological and climate emergency for inter and intra generational equity.

The CoG boss noted that recent reports by Kenya Forest Services (KFS) indicate that the current tree cover is at 12 per cent, with most counties showing significant increase in tree and forest cover.

Forest departments

She pointed out that so far, 18 counties have enacted their Forest Laws, while 43 have enacted climate change acts, demonstrating the readiness and commitment of the devolved administration units in climate change mitigation.

Ms Waiguru said that among the critical issues to be addressed in order to achieve forest and rangeland restoration, include strengthening county forest departments as well as deployment of forest technical advisory personnel from KFS to work closely with county governments.

She said the CoG and counties are ready to partner with the national government and key stakeholders to support the Presidential tree growing initiative.

Egypt, which is the host has said that it wants to move from negotiations and planning to implementation.

At the end of the conference, participants will also recognize various countries for their efforts in tackling the climate crisis.