English

Abstract

The consequences of climate change, apart from being serious challenges to humanity, are especially threatening to develop countries. Climate change endangers human health through its effects on the stability of ecosystems and acts as a catalyst to disease pandemics. Multilateral climate change treaties serve as vital mechanisms to foster state-level action against the threat of climate change - super-conventional warfare. International treaties and collective regional and/or global policy could spur domestic action to address the health hazards caused by climate change. However, developing countries face multi-dimensional challenges in implementing environmentally viable policies to address climate change. The efficacy of policies and laws indeveloping countries within the shifting global climate change paradigmgives rise to a number of legal and pragmatic questions. Developing countries, therefore, must move for reforms at the institutional level to promote conservation of environment and resources, and address the pressing questions regarding climate change. There have been efforts to reach a global consensus to address climate change, which has resulted in the industrialized North inimical to the developing South. The global North seems to emphasize on the shared responsibilities of allnations to reduce emissions while the global South waves the flag of differentiated responsibilities. The global North-South negotiations are derived from inequalityin the historical and current levels of emission of greenhouse gases, the emerging consequences of climate change in the face of the geopolitical landscapebetween modern nation-states. The basic tenets of 'Kenya Vision 2030' and the 'Constitution of Kenya 2010' are steady growth and sustainable development.The Constitution recognizes a clean and healthy environment as a basic human right and provides for sustainable exploitation, utilization, management and conservation of the environment and natural resources. Kenya affirms, cognizant of the challenges faced today, that it is committed to undertaking a transition to a green economy in line with the outcome of the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD) held in 2012. The outcome document of the Rio+20 summit; The Future We Want, (UNCSD, 2012) highlighted transition to a green economy as a means towards sustainable development. Transitioning could contribute to eradicating poverty, as well as sustained economic growth, increasing social inclusion, improving human welfare, and creating opportunities for employment and decent work for all, while maintaining the healthy functioning of the Earth's ecosystems. The Kenyan govt. is developing a green economy strategy to support development efforts towards addressing key challenges such as poverty, unemployment, inequality, environmental degradation, climate change and variability, infrastructure leakages and food insecurity. The Kenya Green Economy Assessment Report launched by the UNEP (2014) concluded that Kenya is already implementing various green economy approaches and policies and that the transition to a green economy reflects positive impacts in the medium and long term across sectors of the economy. By 2030, a green growth path will result in faster growth, a cleaner environment, and high productivity, relative to the 'business as usual' growth scenario. In the Medium Term Plan 2013-2017, the Government committed to developing a Green Economy Strategy. There is also a need to ensure that work designed to facilitate the transition to a green economy is consistent with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) envisioned at Rio+20. The SDGs cover various aspects of sustainable development from ending poverty and hunger, to health, equality and inclusion, and access to energy. Green Economy provides an avenue for functional interaction between Economy and the SDGs. The SDGs, although pending adoption, provide a framework within which green growth targets can help reorient national economic development planning as well as guide the behavior of both the public and private sectors. Therefore, we seek to understand, through this paper the evolution and impact of various mechanisms of the Kenyan environmental policy as well as examine Kenya's transition to becoming 'Green economy.