County Climate Change Fund

County Climate Change Fund is a mechanism through which counties can create, access and use climate finance from different sources to build communities resilience and reduce vulnerabilities to a changing climate in a more coordinated way. Here is a brief description of key guiding principles, components and strategic importance of CCCF mechanism:

A. Guiding principles

  1. Community driven, bottom up planning – Local people have their own experience, knowledge and institutions for managing climate variability and extreme weather events. Recognising and strengthening their perspectives and capacities is likely to increase effectiveness, value for money, and sustainability.
  2. Anchored within and supportive of devolution – Devolution provides a means to channel climate finance to sub-national levels and communities. This is enhanced by the CCCF mechanism and ensures that sustainability and continuity are achieved.
  3. Flexible learning approach – Uncertainty about future climate change, as well as its effects on people, economies and environments, means that mechanisms for planning and financing must learn and adapt.
  4. Focus on public good investments – County governments are mandated to manage public funds in ways that benefit all citizens under their jurisdiction. Collective action helps to strengthen local environments and economies and protect the most vulnerable.
  5. Inclusion – Inclusiveness is a national value and principle of governance. Inclusive decision-making may reduce the risk of conflict, enhance the sustainability of investments and addresses power relations.

B. Components

The CCCF mechanism consists of four interrelated components that are:

  1. County Climate Change Fund – This is a public fund designed to finance local adaptation and managed at the discretion of the county government, CCCFs are capitalised from a variety of sources, including county budgets, the National Climate Change Fund, domestic and international partners. Most of the fund (70 percent) is allocated towards level investment to finance local adaptation, with the remaining 30 percent divided between county-level investments and operational costs. Communities are informed of their budgets in advance of planning to allow identification and implementation of projects that are within the budget.
  2. Climate Change Planning Committees – These are committees elected and appointed at the ward and national level to support the implementation of the CCCF mechanism. The Ward Climate Change Planning Committees (WCCPC) is the central pillar of the mechanism. Their members are representative of the various locations, social groups and livelihood systems in the ward. They have an operational fund which allows them to carry out their duties: for example, they help communities analyse their resilience to present and future climate risks and use the findings to prioritise investments that the fund can support. The WCCPC are elected publicly and according to their standing in the community and not education qualification. Government technical staff are co-opted to provide advice as necessary but do not have any decision-making powers. A county climate change planning committee (CCCPC) gives technical support to the wards and approves their proposals. It also decides how to allocate the county-level proportion of the fund available for county-wide investments. Its members are drawn from the technical departments of the county government, ward county climate change planning committees and other stakeholders, and they work under the oversight of a CCCF Steering Committee or Board. A Fund Administrator oversees day-to-day operations.
  3. Climate Information and Resilience Planning Tools-The resilience planning tools are used by communities to identify elements that (resilience assessments and participatory resource mapping) build or weaken their resilience to the changing climate. The tools empower local communities to participate in budgeting processes (enhance public participation) at county level and provide an opportunity for county government and communities to discuss how local livelihoods function and interact, the factors that constrain their resilience to the impacts of climate change and practical ways to build adaptive capacity and long-term resilience. Climate information provided by the Kenya Meteorological Department (KMD) strengthens the decisions taken by the CCCF planning committees and by individual households.
  4. Monitoring and Evaluation of Adaptation– This component of the CCCF helps the county know whether the mechanism is appropriate and cost-effective, and whether it is improving the climate resilience of vulnerable communities and groups. It advocates a ‘learning by doing’ approach, which allows for testing, reflection and adjustment as situations change. CCCF commitments and climate change more broadly are integrated within the overall performance management framework for county governments.

 

Importance of the CCCF mechanism

  1. Finance: the CCCF strengthens existing legal, financial and fiduciary frameworks and standards for county government to access climate finance from different sources both at National and International level.
  2. Public participation: CCCF recognises and enhances public participation to ensure greater social inclusion and public accountability.
  3. Climate information: Integrate climate change and resilience into CIDPs and budgeting through the use of climate information to address current and future climate risks.
  4. Monitoring and evaluation: Strengthen existing Monitoring and Evaluation systems to track adaptation and resilience building.
County Climate Change Fund Achievements

1. 18 Counties enacted CCCF legislation.

2. 13 Counties validated climate information services plans (CISP).

3. 11 Counties established climate change planning committees

4. 11 Counties’ strengthened County Integrated Monitoring and Evaluation System (CIMES)
to respond to Climate Change

5. CCCF curriculum developed and domiciled at Kenya School of Government (KSG)

6. 30 CCCF Training of Trainers (ToT) certified by the Kenya School of Government (KSG)

7. CCCF being scaled out by The Government of the Republic of Kenya (GoK)

8. CCCF contextualized in urban and peri-urban setups in 7 counties