In Summary
- Elizabeth Gitari an Environmental Lawyer says that communities have already raised concerns with some of the amendments in the Climate Change Bill 2023 whose one of the major tenets is cutting emissions
- According to Gitari communities want their interests to be safeguarded and protected in the new law.
Experts have warned against the enactment of the proposed amendments of the Climate Change Bill, 2023 without incorporating communities’ inputs.
Elizabeth Gitari an Environmental Lawyer says that communities have already raised concerns with some of the amendments in the Climate Change Bill 2023 whose one of the major tenets is cutting emissions.
Gitari during a meeting with editors organized by Journalists for Human Rights stated that the bill which seeks to introduce nature based solutions to Climate Change has Carbon Trading as one of the solutions.
“Carbon credits are produced by active, intentional decisions and regenerative practices that remove and store carbon. Buyers of carbon credits are paying for the regenerative practices that result in improvements to ecosystem health and subsequent carbon removal,” said Gitari.
According to Gitari communities want their interests to be safeguarded and protected in the new law.
“They do not want to be taken advantage of by some of these companies that are already emitting carbon into the air. This can happen through greenwashing and by green washing I mean the companies paying for equal amount of carbon they are emitting into the air therefore not helping the environment at all,” she stated.
Abject Poverty
Many communities living within areas where carbon trade programme is being practiced in Kenya are already living in abject poverty despite participating in the lucrative project.
Other concerns in the Climate Change Ammendment Bill are the deletions of clauses that state that community representatives in the councils must have indigenous knowledge and knowledge on climate change issues that sit.
President William Ruto since his inauguration as president has been big on climate change.
Last year in his COP 27 speech, Ruto stated his intention of making Kenya the number one carbon exporter in the world.
“One of the things that President William Ruto did was to make a statement that he wants Kenya to be the number one carbon exporter in the world so this Climate Change Bill is a presidential agenda. We are just asking that these concerns by these communities be looked into before the bill is passed into law.”
