AGEYO'S ANGLE: No amount of talk will turn down the climate heat

The 7th Devolution Conference is nearing its close. This will for all practical purposes be the last such gathering of county leaders before the country heads to the next general election.

It is therefore noteworthy, nay, commendable that they chose to focus on what is arguably one of the biggest threats to human existence as we know it today, that is climate change. I say this is commendable because, for the first time since I started covering such issues some 20 years ago, an environmental issue is making such waves that it can actually form the key theme of a gathering of top decision-makers in government.

You see, when I was starting out, I remember how environmental stories such as pollution of rivers, cutting down of forests, accumulation of garbage were seen as appendages of news bulletins or buried deep inside the obscure pages of newspapers.

So much so that one politician on being appointed assistant minister of health quite derogatively asked whether he was expected to go and plant trees – he declined the job.

Indeed, even the outrage over the brutality unleashed on the now deceased environmental icon, Prof Wangari Maathai as she sought to protect Karura forest in the late 1990s, was more about the indignity and inhumanity of police action, than the substantial issues of forest conservation that she stood for.

In fact, the story was packaged even internationally as part of the political intolerance that characterised the 40-year year rule of KANU. In this respect, the late Maathai was way ahead of her time.

You must have seen the frenzy at the just-concluded climate summit in Glasgow to freeze any further destruction of forests by 2030 – not because we love forests, but because we finally recognise the crucial role, they play in keeping our planet cool and liveable. 

And so, this week, climate change is not topping the agenda in Makueni because it has a nice sounding name or because some visionary leader somewhere in his wisdom chose to put it front and centre.  No, climate change has literally forced its way onto the agenda of everyone all across the world.

The impacts are there for all to see and the costs are being born by real human beings. We can no longer pretend we don’t know it exists.  Yet the lack of real commitment to tackle this problem, is just as glaring.

Over the last two days, it emerged that of all the 47 counties in Kenya, only six have set aside a specific fund to deal with the impacts of climate change. Further, more than 10 counties are yet to pass any legislation on tackling climate change.

So for all the right-sounding talk in Makueni, nothing will change until the governors begin to put their money where their mouths are.

This conversation must now move from climate change to what experts call climate action – both in terms of dealing with the causes of climate change as well as the suffering it causes to ordinary Kenyans.

The county governments must now set aside part of their development budget and ring-fence it for climate action. And a budget means money, not figures on a piece of paper. They could start with simple actions such as drilling boreholes and powering them using solar energy.

This would not only be good for the planet, but it would also deal with the acute water shortage caused by drought that has since increased in frequency and intensity owing to climate change.

Secondly, every county in this country has dumpsites. Now, these are often a rich source of methane which is one of the gases that cause climate change, yet it can also be harnessed to provide cooking gas for crucial facilities such as slaughterhouses and even homes.

Counties must see biogas as a real alternative to firewood and charcoal which are still used by more than 80 per cent of Kenyans for their daily cooking. Of course, more charcoal and firewood means that more trees will have to die and more forests will have to disappear.

Now, I have spoken about climate change for some weeks now, not because it is my favourite subject or because it is an exciting topic. But because it is important and has the potential of rendering everything else irrelevant.

So I end with a quote that the county bosses would do well to remember as they conclude their summit. It is a tweet from Barack Obama, way back in September of 2014 which rings true today as it did then.

He said: “We are the first generation to feel the effect of climate change and the last generation who can do something about it.Enough said. And that is my angle for the week.

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