ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (PAMACC News) - Citizens of Africa have been urged to take advantage of investment opportunities that accompany climate action to earn some money and lift their people from poverty.
 
Secretary-General of the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA), Mithika Mwenda, has noted that the renewable energy revolution currently being witnessed in the world provides affordable access to energy to people who would otherwise not have access.
 
He noted that renewable energy has also aided in the reduction of emissions, thus contributing to the attainment of the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) ambitions of countries.
 
“We are witnessing renewable energy revolution and in Africa and the rest of the world, this is an explosive sector,” observed Mithika. “We need to take advantage of the investment opportunities coming with climate action; there are a lot of resources in this to help address poverty”.
 
At the COP21 climate talks which produced the Paris Agreement, the G7 committed to allocate US$10 billion into the African Renewable Energy Initiative (AREI).
 
Though there are concerns with delivering the promise, the Initiative, in its current design, will help cure chronic energy poverty by supporting decentralized, modern, off-grid and people-owned energy systems not only for lighting, but also cooking, driving smallholder agribusiness and charging mobile phones.
 
Mithika added that green energy has helped save lives by reducing indoor pollution.
 
Fossil fuel vs. renewable energy economies
 
Mithika Mwenda was addressing an event on low-carbon and climate-resilient development, held on the sidelines of the 2018 African Union Summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
 
Most African countries do not contribute any significant amount of greenhouse gases but there are commitments in their NDCs to ensure that their development pathways are carbon neutral.
 
In a climate-constrained world, investment in fossil fuel-based energy sources no longer makes sense.
 
But Africa faces the dilemma of whether to rapidly revert to renewable energy, have a mix of both fossil fuels and renewables, or ignore the global call and continue in the unsustainable model of development pursued by industrialized countries which brought the climate crisis.
 
What is evident, though, is the fact that the global community has shifted.
 
This shift should make African countries re-think their priority energy sources and investment in oil and in some instances coal, as it may not make economic sense in the long-run.
 
The Addis Ababa side-event, attended by climate actors from across the continent, is organized strategically to get African leaders to focus attention on climate change issues.
 
As the first Pan African convention after the COP23, the event offered an opportunity to exchange ideas and reflect on Africa’s victories during the Bonn Climate Change Conference, with a view of charting a collective path towards subsequent Global Dialogue processes on the subject.
 
“This gives us the platform to develop common African narratives that will have impact on the global stage,” said James Murombedzi, Officer-in-Charge of the African Climate Policy Centre (ACPC) of the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA).
 
Moving along the development pathway
 
Climate change is no longer discussed as a limited environmental or scientific matter but as a development issue.
 
African civil society therefore looks forward to leaders moving from the rhetoric to taking real action on the ground.
 
“The momentum for the implementation of the Paris Agreement and the NDCs is picking up, but the question is: are we moving with that pace in Africa?” queried Mithika.
 
Some countries on the continent have developed very effective policy and legal frameworks to facilitate the implementation in the areas of transparency, adaptation, loss and damage, among others.
 
But there are others stuck on bureaucracies to push the climate agenda forward.
 
“We need to think broader about what is the impact of climate change on development. What does it mean for agriculture? What does it mean for energy, for infrastructure? So we are really talking about development,” said Mithika.
 
He believes that the ClimDev-Africa programme can rally the African continent around in mobilizing action and “we need to ensure that critical centres that support the livelihoods of the African people and which are weather sensitive like agriculture are created”.
 
The Climate for Development in Africa (ClimDev-Africa) Programme is an initiative of the African Union Commission (AUC), the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and the African Development Bank (AfDB), established to create a solid foundation for Africa’s response to climate change.

OPINION

Corruption and climate change are arguably the defining challenges facing the worldtoday. Both problems - and their solutions - are interlinked. In particular, corruption is one of the driving forces behind deforestation and forest degradation, a major cause of climate change (according to the UN, deforestation and forest degradation account for around17 cent of carbon emissions worldwide).  

Interventions to reduce deforestation and forest degradation therefore have totake corruption risks into account.There have to be robust anti-corruption mechanisms and sound governance systems in placeto ensure thatforests are preserved transparently and accountably.

The United Nations Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) mechanism, seeks to conserve forests in developing countries.

Although Kenya’s work on REDD+ began in 2008, little progress has been made in implementing it to conserve the country’s forests.

In 2013, a corruption risk assessment for REDD+ in Kenya prescribeda range of recommendations for different stakeholders. As a result, the Kenya Task Force on Anti-Corruption for REDD+ was established, and operated between 2014 and 2015.Aiming to enhance dialogue among different stakeholdersabout the relationshipbetween REDD+ and corruption, it brought together national actors working on forest governance, anti-corruption and transparency.

Until recently, corruption and governance were not major parts of conversations in relation to forest conservation. As a result, many REDD+stakeholders in Kenya and the world over had a limitedunderstanding of theconnection between corruption and REDD+ - corruption is almost always a significant factor in the illegal exploitation of forest areas and thus threatens initiatives such as REDD+. The majority of countries that are heavily forested and benefiting from REDD+ are also those where corruption is perceived to be high and corruption is often endemic in the forestry sector of these countries. A new report from Transparency International Kenya found that the taskforce managed to quicklyfill the knowledge gapthrough consultation and information sharing.

The taskforce achieved significant milestones, notably bringing the anti-corruption and transparency agenda into the centre of REDD+ processes.

Additionally, the taskforce brought together an unusually diverse blend of stakeholders in a country with numerous tensions between government institutions, civil society and indigenous communities. This collaboration enabled progressive dialogue about corruption and governance to take place in various parts of the forestry sector.

The taskforce, however, seems to have largely focused on national actors, leaving behind county-level stakeholders who are vital in the management of forests. Kenya has a highlydevolved system of governance, meaning that county governments hold considerable responsibility for forest and natural resource governance.

The taskforce encountered other significant challenges, such as resource constraints and significant staff turnover at some of its member organisations. Coupled with a lack of proper documentation of the taskforce’s work, this made it challenging for successor projects to quickly integrate and push on with the work. While these challenges did not prevent the taskforce from achieving significant milestones, they are serious considerations that should be taken into account when establishing other multi-stakeholder approaches.

Kenya’s approach to addressing these challenges in the forestry sector is worth strengthening andreplicating.Kenya is at a crucialstage of developing its framework for REDD+ implementation and the task force has immense potential to make REDD+ successful in the country.

Its founders, including the REDD+ Coordinating Office, the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission, and Transparency International Kenya,should consider reviving the initiative while addressing the challenges faced during its initial lifespan, including admitting county-level stakeholders.

Read the assessment report on Kenya’s Task Force on Anti-Corruption for REDD+.

Psamson Nzioki leads the Climate Governance Integrity Programme at Transparency International Kenya.

NAIROBI, Kenya (PAMACC News) - Eleven environmental organisations from across the world have called on the Finnish government to suspend a €9.5 million fund to the Kenya Forest Service (KFS) because of escalating human rights abuses of the country’s indigenous Sengwer people.

In a joint letter addressed to the President of the Republic Mr. Sauli Niinistö, with copy to the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Minister of Foreign Trade and Development, the organisations, most of them international NGOs noted that KFS bases its approach to forest conservation on evicting forest communities from their ancestral lands. “These are the very communities who have the knowledge and commitment to protect their forests,” reads part of the letter.

The letter was handed to the Finnish government on 24th January 2016 - the day the Sengwer community members of Embobut Forest gathered for the funeral of Robert Kirotich, a 41-year-old man who was allegedly shot dead by a KFS solder on 16th January while out herding cattle on the Sengwer’s ancestral land.

So far, the European Union has already suspended the funding of a €31 million project to the Kenyan government and KFS in response to such killings. A delegation from the EU is planning to conduct a site visit, with Amnesty International and the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR).

The Finnish Government has been the main supporter of the Kenya Forest Service (KFS) over many years, and the organisations feel that it too shares significant responsibility for funding what they refer to as human rights abuses.

In a statement, Justin Kenrick, a senior policy advisor at Forest Peoples Programme (FPP) pointed out that the Finnish government has been a major funder of KFS over many years, and that it needs to learn from KFS's history of illegally logging the forests they are supposed to protect.

“Conservation science is clear that securing the collective land rights of such indigenous forest communities, communities who have cared for their lands for centuries, is the surest way of securing such forests and the flow of water from them to Kenya,” said Kenrick.

“The Finnish government should (instead) support forest indigenous communities to secure their constitutionally recognised land rights, rather than fund KFS which violently evicts them," he added.

On January 22, the Eldoret High Court in Kenya issued a court order stopping the police from evicting members of the Sengwer community from the Embobut Forest. However, according to the environment conservation organisations, a community member Mr Yator Kiptum had reported of continued evictions with KFS guards allegedly burning down more Sengwer homes in Kapkok glade, Embobut forest.

Another Sengwer community member Milka Chepkorir Kuto told delegates at the Investing in Human Rights Defenders event in Brussels that human rights abuses have been ongoing for decades, though it was now intensifying.

She said: “Today Kirotich, one of my own community members, is being buried. He leaves behind a family that looked up to him. He was killed by KFS in Embobut forest during their violent forceful evictions. KFS officers are committing massive human rights violations. Any funding and any organisation or person willing to fund KFS is funding violations directly or indirectly.”

The eleven environmental organisations petitioning the Finish government include the FPP, the IP Hub Africa, EU based FERN, the BIC, the ICCA Consortium, Both ENDS, Natural Justice, iied, Life Mosaic, Maan Ystavat, and Rainforest Foundation UK.

KWALE, Kenya (PAMACC News) - Balozi Dena may have felt helpless in stopping land encroachment that has stalked poor villages in coastal Kenya for the last 68 years of his life. But he is keen on leaving a legacy: protection of indigenous plants.

The elder from Ukunda village in Kwale, has been working with community conservation groups like Coastal Forest Conservation Unit (CFCU) to prevent the destruction of Kaya forests. He is not sure if he is winning.

“It is difficult,” says the father of six. “Most parts of the forests have already been grabbed. Attempting to remove the occupants can sometimes lead to bloodshed.”

During his youth, the Kaya forests - which were thick belts of lowland woodland - surrounded villages and were believed to be sacred by the Mijikenda community.

Cutting trees for timber, grazing of livestock and clearing of farmland were strictly prohibited, he says.

“The forests were places where individuals facing problems in their daily lives could go and seek help by praying there,” he says.

They had another purpose, which is keeping him vigilant lately: medicinal plants.

Studies show that Kenya’s coastal province is endowed with more than half of known rare tree species and shrubs in the country.

But their sacred and medicinal value may remain etched in the memories of a gone generation, if the continued encroachment for property development is not stopped.

“It is the tourism obsession,” argues Dena. “Permanent buildings now stand where forests once flourished.”

That may appear so to Dena.

But a status report on Kenyan forests by the 2016 Kenya Water Towers Agency report lists charcoal burning, logging and illegal harvesting of unique plant species as some of the leading threats facing the country’s ecosystem.

For instance, by the time the report was being released, Kenya had less than 3.5 per cent of gazetted forest.    

In 1990, there were 4,670,866 hectares of forest cover while in 2000, the figure reduced to 3,492,358 hectares.

“This destruction of forests can be blamed on the failure by the government to separate community land from public land,” argues Mohamed Swazuri, chairman of Kenya’s National Land Commission.

The price for such anomaly is high: loss of indigenous knowledge stored by rare plants, according to Kamau Ngugi, the executive director, National Coalition of Human Rights Defenders.

“The government should learn how to tap traditional knowledge held by communities living around forests in order to conserve our plant genetic wealth,” says Kamau. “That is a very critical knowledge that we are losing as a society.”

Dena seems to agree. And if his bet is right this time, he just might be getting there.

A botanical garden at the Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT) is working with communities like Dena’s, to conserve plant genetic wealth threatened by forest encroachment.

“It is a project between the government of the Peoples Republic of China and the government of the Republic of Kenya,” says Prof. Robert Gituru, the founding Director, Sino Africa Joint Research Center SAJOREC, which hosts the garden.

Established in 2014 by Kenyan and Chinese scientists, the garden invites communities to take unique and endangered plants in the country for conservation at the facility.  

These include indigenous, medicinal and rare plants found in Kenya, says Prof. Gituru, adding that:

“By conserving them at the garden, they are studied to understand their unique traits like growth, adoptability, economic and genetic characteristics.”

This information is then shared with the public to help them convert the skills into conserving the plants at their natural habitats in future, he added.

“A scientist has to go to the field because that is where there is biodiversity,” says Prof. Gituru. “But having a botanical garden near a study facility is important because this is where one can make references and records.”

According to him, the facility will help Kenya tap indigenous knowledge and make advances in medical research.

“Majority of Kenyans and the rest of Africa depend to a large extent on herbal medicine,” he says. “Our plants are a living pharmacy. When someone chooses to use it to cure illnesses, it is in order.”

According to the genetic resources research institute at the Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization (KARLO), Kenya had over 7,500 plant species growing naturally by 2015.
Meanwhile, Dena says an initiative like the botanical garden may hold the answer to protecting Kenya’s plant genetic wealth and indigenous knowledge.

“But such gardens should be established in all parts of the country to ensure that communities can easily access them without travelling long distances,” says Dena.

This work was produced as a result of a grant provided by the Africa-China Reporting Project managed by the Journalism Department of the University of the Witwatersrand.