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The government has been urged to empower grassroots organisations that are actively engaging in environmental conservation activities and supporting the climate change initiative.

This call has been made by a lobby group, Adopt-a-Tree Movement, that points out that the government came up with an agenda to plan 15 billion trees by 2032, but failed to set strategies for how to collaborate with stakeholders at the local level who could be instrumental in helping the government achieve its climate change objective.

Speaking during a tree planting exercise at the Ruai Treatment Plant in Nairobi at the weekend, the Movement’s environmentalist Samuel Odhiambo, says the government should provide funding and other logistical support and further proposes that there should be a clearly set out policy that will guarantee the support has proper channels for how it is provided to the groups.

“The government just rolled out the climate change program which is very ambitious, but it did not bring together all stakeholders to build the capacity through which the objective would be achieved,” notes Odhiambo.

There is a proposal that county governments should have a legislative policy through which there will be formation of ward climate committees. Through this committees, Odhiambo notes, it will be easy to coordinate, and mobilise ground volunteers.

The Movement’s climate change ambassador Alice Wanjiru (pictured) aged 10, emphasised on the importance of tackling climate change which has become a global challenge.

She says, “The continuing change in climate across the world is posing a threat to our society as a whole with no clear remedy. The effects of this weather changes are also resulting in frequently extreme droughts, floods and landslides. Various recurring health issues are observed in people, such as asthma, heart problems, and cancer which are clearly due to the climate change. We must act.”

Climate change

The issue of climate change is a huge monster that calls for collaboration with like-minded individuals who want to be like the little humming bird that did what it could to try and save the forest when it caught fire.

Wanjiru aims to plant at least 10 million trees by 2027. To achieve this and with the support of the movement, the young ambassador is now using birthday celebrations especially targeting children in a campaign that aims at recruiting as many children as can be possible to the climate change agenda.

The Ruai Sewer-line tree planting exercise was a birthday celebration for kids who celebrates their birthdays in the months of December and January. Over 200 kids turned up for the initiative where over 2000 trees were planted to help tackle the air pollution emanating from the sewer that serves Nairobi County as a whole.

“Many a time trees are planted but they are not taken care of. This is one area that the government and all people who are planting trees must be keen to change if we have to achieve the climate change agenda,” she warns.