Trends and Regulatory Challenges of Environmental Institutions: Evidences from Federal and selected Regions of Ethiopia

Abstract

The trend of development of environmental institutions in the third world has experienced a considerable lag since 1970s compared to the pace and scale of environmental threats; and mainly challenged by poor autonomy, weak regulatory capacity, and inadequate political support. Ethiopia, being prone to recurrent droughts and environmental maladies, has been grappled with policy responses towards building green and environmentally benign economy. The objective of this study was to explore the trends of institutionalization in environment sector and the challenges that hamper their regulatory performances in Ethiopia. Based on evidences from federal to local levels, the study has indicated that Ethiopia has made its late debut in institutionalization of environmental mandates in early 1990s and introduced three waves of institutional reforms so far. The institutionalization process both at the center and regional levels has got some arduous challenges, most of which were akin to the experiences of other developing countries. However, there were some distinct challenges in Ethiopian context such as sustained influence from agriculture sector coupled with parochialism in mandate allocation, recurrence of droughts that mostly caught the wits of policy makers, and resource laden economic growth which utterly undermined environmental regulations. Therefore, redefining institutional mandates to avoid role conflict, elevating their status and autonomy, and working towards filling the environmental knowledge deficit could be amicable solutions.