By Enyichukwu Enemanna
President of Kenya, William Ruto has featured in Time Magazine’s list of world’s 100 most influential leaders shaping global climate action.
The listing comes in the same week Ruto declared a national holiday aiming at planting 100 million trees in a single day to mitigate climate change impact is known as “Time 100 Climate”.
It was released on Thursday, and it is the magazine’s inaugural attempt to name those it considers to have made significant contributions on the issue of climate change across the globe.
The listing comes in the week he led a national holiday aimed at planting 100 million trees in a single day.
The Kenyan leader was named alongside the mayor of Sierra Leone’s capital Freetown, Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr, Burkinabé-German architect Francis Kéré and Ethiopian climate entrepreneur Kidus Asfaw.
The magazine said it selected those listed for “making significant progress in fighting climate change by creating business value”.
The honourees were chosen because their efforts in fighting climate change were recent and produced “measurable, scalable achievements” rather than “commitments and announcements”, Time stated.
Mr Ruto has been proactive in dealing with the impact of climate change in Kenya and African continent.
The tree-planting holiday held on 13 November was part of his larger ambition for Kenya to plant 15 billion trees in 10 years.
In September, he hosted the first ever Africa Climate Summit in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, which ended in a joint declaration demanding that major polluters commit more resources to help poorer nations.
Mr Ruto’s recognition as a leader on climate action also came as the World Bank on Friday warned that Kenya’s economic output could decline by 7.25% by 2050 if the East African country fails to tackle climate change.
