Analysing Uganda’s education policy on clean, renewable energy

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By Mary salome Namirembe

Education plays a vital role in shaping behaviours, fostering collective action and cultivating the skills needed to address environmental challenges.

It enables individuals to understand the complexities of climate change, the interconnectedness of ecological and societal systems and the steps required to mitigate their impacts.

This transformative potential extends across all stages from Primary Education to lifelong learning which fosters awareness, innovation action on clean and renewable energy.

Climate change is caused by ‘global warming’, an increase in the Earth’s surface temperature resulting from increased volumes of heat-trapping gases, referred to as greenhouse gases (GHGs) and its is a huge concern for Uganda and a key driver for the renewable energy need in the country. The threat of climate change affects all sectors of the economy and its impacts go beyond national borders.

Uganda has borne the effects of climate with clear changes in precipitation (rainfall), water availability, length of seasons, incidents of extreme weather patterns, floods, desertification, distribution and prevalence of pests and diseases. About 20% of global CO2 emissions are caused by deforestation.

In LDCs, 62% of total emissions originate in land-use change and primarily deforestation. For Uganda’s case, some of the causes of deforestation include conversion for agriculture, settlement and urbanization.

In addition, majority of Ugandans depend on fuel wood as a source of energy at household levels, hence forest trees are cut for production of charcoal. One of the most effective solutions to combat climate change is the transition from traditional fossils to clean and renewable energy sources. Uganda is rich in clean energy resources, including hydropower, biomass, solar energy, geothermal and wind.

According to Sustainable Energy for All report, Uganda’s physical energy resource potential includes an estimated 2,000MW of hydroelectric power, 450MW of geothermal energy, 1,650MW of biomass cogeneration), 460 million tons of biomass in stock with a sustainable annual output of 50 million tons and an average of 5.1kWh/m2 /day of solar energy. However, this energy potential has yet to be fully utilized.

The overall renewable energy power generation potential is estimated to be 5,300 MW. This energy source produces minimal or no greenhouse emissions. As an intervention, the government is increasingly promoting the use of climate-friendly energy in form of renewable energy options as derived from natural sources that are replenished continuously.

This supports Uganda’s Vision 2040 which recognises the need to develop appropriate adaptation and mitigation strategies on climate change over the vision period and to ensure that the country is cushioned from the associated adverse impacts. It therefore recommends that the Environmental concerns must be mainstreamed in all sector policies and frameworks to ensure sustainable management of environmental resources.

Uganda has implemented different policies such as the Uganda Green Growth Strategy Policy, The National Environmental Policy, the National Climate Change Policy which are to ensure that all stakeholders address climate change causes and impacts through appropriate measures while promoting sustainable development and a green economy in a harmonized approach towards a climate-resilient and low-carbon development path for sustainable development.

The  National Climate Change Learning Strategy supports the different policies as it spells out the urgent need to strengthen human skills and capacity development for purposes of addressing climate change with priority topics required by individuals to include among others; Fundamentals of climate change, Predicting climate change scenarios, Vulnerability and adaptive capacity assessment, Climate Change and disaster risk management, Greenhouse Gas inventory, development, Carbon markets and enhancing vocational and technology development in order to facilitate individual learning to propel growth.

Uganda's education policy regarding clean and renewable energy and climate change focuses on collaborations, incorporating climate change awareness and education into the curriculum across primary and secondary school levels, Technical and Higher institutions of learning aiming to create an environmentally conscious generation through campaigns and initiatives that promote understanding of sustainable energy practices which includes integrating topics like renewable energy sources, energy efficiency, and climate change mitigation strategies into relevant subjects. 

Despite all the educational levels having anchored climate change learning in their respective curricula there is need to harmonize climate change learning among different institutions and levels.

The different parties concerned with the coordination such as MOES, and NCDC need to bring together different stakeholders through a series of harmonization meetings to streamline climate change learning which is springing up independently at the various levels of primary Education, secondary Education, Business, technical and Vocational Education and Training and Higher Education. This should cause synchronization on who imparts what knowledge at each level.

Additionally, I expected the Education Policy Review Commission (EPRC) report which was launched in January 2025 to have made relevant observations and recommendations as regards to the implementation of these climate adaptation and mitigation policies as highlighted in the National Climate Change Learning Strategy. The report did not clearly report on the effect of climate change on Education or the contributions of Education on climate change mitigation and adaptation, climate change action points such clean and renewable energy or give a recommendation in that regard.

For that reason, would it mean that the committee never got any information or observed the climate change impacts during interfaces with diverse stakeholders, during public hearings or as they carried out country-wide consultations?

 Therefore, the inadequacy of The Education Policy Review Commission to analyze the climate action points implemented by these educational institutions and make recommendations will undermine a holistic understanding of the dynamics and significant obstacles that the Education sector is facing hence compromising the attainment of SDG 13 which focuses on "Taking urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts. The need for the EPRC to address climate change action points in its report is fundamental for the new government white paper to focus on Modernizing Uganda’s Education System to meet the 21^st century needs for a sustainable future.

The writer is executive director, Edupulse Advisory