This impact story is from our 2021 annual report.

Air pollution is linked to hundreds of thousands of deaths every year across Africa and is a growing public health issue in Kenya, causing around 18 000 premature deaths annually, as well as millions of cases of respiratory disease. In Nairobi, as in many fast-growing cities around the world, the health impacts of air pollution disproportionately affect the poor and vulnerable and are a brake on development and economic progress.

Sustained engagement brings results

The urgency of tackling Nairobi’s deteriorating air quality has spurred policymakers and civil society to act. Since 2016, SEI Africa has partnered with the city on developing policy responses that can tackle the challence. And last year these efforts bore fruit. The County Parliament adopted an Air Quality Policy,
as well as an Air Quality Bill, which will be taken through the County Assembly in 2022.

The legal and policy instruments were driven forward during a series of workshops for city legislators, run by SEI Africa in partnership with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). The interactive sessions aimed to empower the Parliamentary Committee on Environment and Natural Resources by providing evidence on air quality in Nairobi, and by sharing lessons from other cities, to support evidence-based air quality legislation for Nairobi.

Commitment to implementation

At the workshops, city parliamentarians and government representatives reviewed the legislative framework, alongside representatives from technical
institutions, national transport and energy sector agencies, and academics from local universities.

The aims were to lay out the legislative framework for air quality management, discuss and agree on the key elements of the Nairobi Draft Air Quality Bill, develop a roadmap and strategy for finalizing and adopting the Bill, and to raise awareness on budgeting for an air quality unit to support the implementation of the Bill once enacted. At the end of discussions, the top leadership of the Nairobi City Council Assembly agreed to the road map and assured the team of its commitment to the draft and its implementation.