Interior Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen has called on Eastern African countries to intensify joint efforts against climate disasters and throw their weight behind Kenya’s latest climate action strategy.
Speaking at the opening of the 2nd Eastern Africa Dialogue Platform on Anticipatory Action in Mombasa, Murkomen stressed the urgent need to move from reacting to disasters after they strike to acting before they happen.
The three-day forum, running through Friday at the PrideInn Paradise Beach Resort, has drawn more than 400 representatives from governments, humanitarian organisations, research institutions and the private sector.
Co-hosted by Kenya and IGAD, this year’s gathering focuses on scaling up early-warning systems, community-level initiatives and pre-arranged emergency funding—from isolated pilot projects into official, government-led systems.
Across the region, communities continue to face punishing droughts on one hand and intense El Niño-driven floods on the other. Getting ahead of these threats, Murkomen said, is essential if lives and local economies are to be protected.
Climate resilience, he noted, is inseparable from national security and disaster management both core responsibilities of his ministry.
He urged local, national and cross-border partners to rally behind the full implementation of Kenya’s National Climate Change Action Plan, arguing that integrating climate measures across public and socio-economic sectors will also support the country’s broader development goals.
At the heart of the dialogue is the shift “from policy to practice.” Murkomen emphasised, “there is the need to put early-warning data, rapid financing mechanisms and anticipatory action to work so that the most vulnerable urban poor households and rural pastoralist communities are safeguarded before flash floods or prolonged droughts hit”
As Interior Minister, he also linked environmental protection directly to state security. “Aggressive climate-smart actions and land restoration,” he said, “are fundamental to national stability, because environmental degradation fuels resource-based displacement and cross-border tensions over shrinking water and grazing lands”
The conference is expected to close with a new regional declaration that sets out concrete commitments on emergency financing, community leadership and improved forecasting across Eastern Africa.
Interior Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen has called on Eastern African countries to intensify joint efforts against climate disasters and throw their weight behind Kenya’s latest climate action strategy.
Speaking at the opening of the 2nd Eastern Africa Dialogue Platform on Anticipatory Action in Mombasa, Murkomen stressed the urgent need to move from reacting to disasters after they strike to acting before they happen.
The three-day forum, running through Friday at the PrideInn Paradise Beach Resort, has drawn more than 400 representatives from governments, humanitarian organisations, research institutions and the private sector.
Co-hosted by Kenya and IGAD, this year’s gathering focuses on scaling up early-warning systems, community-level initiatives and pre-arranged emergency funding from isolated pilot projects into official, government-led systems.
Across the region, communities continue to face punishing droughts on one hand and intense El Niño-driven floods on the other. Getting ahead of these threats, Murkomen said, is essential if lives and local economies are to be protected.
Climate resilience, he noted, is inseparable from national security and disaster management both core responsibilities of his ministry.
He urged local, national and cross-border partners to rally behind the full implementation of Kenya’s National Climate Change Action Plan, arguing that integrating climate measures across public and socio-economic sectors will also support the country’s broader development goals.
At the heart of the dialogue is the shift “from policy to practice.” Murkomen emphasised, “there is the need to put early-warning data, rapid financing mechanisms and anticipatory action to work so that the most vulnerable urban poor households and rural pastoralist communities are safeguarded before flash floods or prolonged droughts hit”
As Interior Minister, he also linked environmental protection directly to state security. “Aggressive climate-smart actions and land restoration,” he said, “are fundamental to national stability, because environmental degradation fuels resource-based displacement and cross-border tensions over shrinking water and grazing lands”
The conference is expected to close with a new regional declaration that sets out concrete commitments on emergency financing, community leadership and improved forecasting across Eastern Africa.
