Residents of Kilifi will now be able to form committees at the ward level to address climate change mitigation measures.
This follows the recent signing in of the Climate Change Act, which has now given room for direct intervention by the county government in addressing Climate change.
It is a new dawn for the residents after Kilifi Governor Amason Kingi signed the Act.
The Act, calls for the creation of about three committees that will be looking at the plans of addressing climate change issues in the county. A fund will also be established to supplement funding activities for activities undertaken to address climate change from the ward level.
Water, Forest and Natural resources County executive Kiringi Mwachitu said the Act now paves way for the devolved government to have a fully participation on matters climate change and a raft of mitigation measures for the same in the county.
“Recently as a department, we had the Climate Change Act signed by the Governor. Some of the key highlights of this Bill are the creation of about three committees. The top committee is the steering committee that will be looking at the plans of the other committee on how to address climate change issues in the county. Then we have the technical committee which does all the technical work in terms of the projects and proposals that are supposed to be brought from the ward level,” he said.
Mr Mwachitu said the Bill asserts that after the technical committee handles these proposals and projects that are supposed to be implemented, they are endorsed by the steering committee.
“At the lower level, we have the ward committees and this is the arm where we have a fully public participation. At the ward level, these particular committees are infact the ones that propose the projects to be carried at the ward,” said Mr Mwachitu.
The Bill also calls for the establishment of the Climate Change Fund that is supposed to be replenished by the county government.
“We proposed 0.5 per cent of the Annual Budget of the County but we are hoping that out of this particular fund, we are also going to get funding from the national government and also other development partners. We have a similar Act at the national level which also has created a fund. What therefore is envisaged is that funds from the national treasury will trickle down to the counties especially in the Arid and Semi-Arid areas through the Climate change Fund,” he said.
Mr Mwachitu said the Climate Change fund does not address or rather handle project that are related to environment only but it cuts across all climate related issues.
The fund will cater for projects in environment department, water, roads, agriculture, livestock and fisheries.
“The factor to consider here is that all these are going to community driven projects. It is the community that will propose which projects they want in a certain area and those are the projects that will be committed to this particular fund,” he said.
He said that Kilifi County is among the top ten counties to have signed the Climate Change Act.
