Can legislative reform reshape climate governance? evaluating Tanzania’s environmental management (amendment) act, 2025, as a legal foundation for carbon market regulation
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Date
2026-03-30
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The sub Saharan Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities (SJSSH)
Abstract
The intensifying urgency of climate change demands that national legal systems move beyond discretionary
policy frameworks toward enforceable regulatory architectures that integrate mitigation, adaptation, and market-based
mechanisms. This article addresses a central question facing developing countries: how can domestic law effectively translate
global climate governance norms into binding institutional and compliance structures? Using Tanzania as a critical case
study following its recent legislative reforms, the article examines the extent to which the Environmental Management
(Amendment) Act, 2025, establishes a legally grounded framework for climate governance and carbon market regulation.
Employing a doctrinal and qualitative analytical methodology, the study systematically analyzes primary legal sources;
including the amended Act, subsidiary regulations, and institutional mandates; situating these within broader global and
regional climate governance frameworks under the Paris Agreement and African Union climate strategies. The analysis
reveals that the 2025 amendments effectuate a fundamental normative transformation by embedding climate change within
statutory definitions, creating the National Carbon Monitoring Centre as a dedicated oversight institution, mandating
climate-sensitive environmental assessments, and establishing legally binding systems for monitoring, reporting, and
verification (MRV) of greenhouse gas emissions. These reforms collectively construct an institutional architecture that aligns
domestic law with the integrity and transparency requirements of Article 6 carbon markets. However, inferential analysis of
the framework's practical implications suggests that the legal provisions alone are insufficient to guarantee effective
implementation. The study identifies critical dependencies: institutional capacity constraints at sub-national levels,
unresolved customary land tenure disputes that threaten carbon project viability, gaps in technical expertise for robust MRV
systems, and the absence of clearly defined, legally enforceable benefit-sharing mechanisms. These factors collectively
mediate the gap between legal formality and governance effectiveness. The article contributes empirically by providing a
systematic analysis of a recent legislative reform within an underexplored African context, and theoretically by demonstrating
how polycentric governance principles can be operationalized through domestic legal design. It concludes that while the 2025
Act provides a necessary and credible legal foundation, its transformative potential will be realized only through sustained
institutional strengthening, targeted capacity-building, and complementary regulatory measures that address land rights and
benefit distribution. The study recommends prioritizing investments in sub-national institutional capacity, finalizing
regulations that reconcile customary and statutory land tenure for carbon projects, and embedding participatory governance
mechanisms to ensure that carbon market participation delivers both environmental integrity and equitable socio-economic
outcomes.
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Journal Article
Keywords
Climate governance, Carbon markets, Legal integration, Tanzania, Environmental Management Act