A Systematic Review of South Africa's Policy Response to Climate Change

Abstract

This study reviews the policies that the South-African government has put in place in response to climate change in order to establish their appropriateness in addressing the issue's of climate change within the South-African context. A systematic review design was followed for this study which involves the formulation of a research question, a search for relevant literature, selection of studies to be included, critical appraisal, data extraction and analysis, and synthesizing of data followed by the formulation of a conclusion statement and contextualization of these statements. The purpose was to collect data and identify high-quality relevant studies and to synthesize the findings in such a rigorous and comprehensive way that a contextualized picture of the current best available evidence is provided. The findings of this study indicate that climate change policies do not hamper national priorities but in actual fact, they are designed to address issues of economic feasibility. They advance the priorities such as poverty alleviation, infrastructure development, job creation, rural development, foreign investment, human resource development, improved health and economic growth. The study is significance in a way that it shows how South Africa should strive to ensure that current and future climate change policies are inclusive, fair and effective. They should reflect a balance between adaptation and mitigation responses and recognize that solving the climate problem will only be possible if developing countries' priorities of eradicating poverty and promoting sustainable development are taken into consideration.