Gender and Climate Change: Plan of Action
--Dr.Debesh Bhowmik
Women are expected to be particularly vulnerable to future changes in climate, but also have particular knowledge and skills that can contribute to climate solutions. Integrating a gender perspective into climate change adaption planning and decision-making is important because of the critical roles women play in supporting households and communities. Women are often the main actors in managing natural resources such as agriculture, forestry and fisheries; sectors that will be seriously affected by climate change impacts such as drought, variable precipitation and flooding. Because of their experiences in these areas, women are aware of changes in their environment and have acquired important knowledge and skills that can help craft effective
adaptation strategies. It is therefore crucial to involve women in adaptation policy and decision-making at the community level, as well as at the national, regional and global levels where their experiences will add value to adaptation planning and decision-making.
Successful climate change adaptation will require an acknowledgment of the gender dimensions of climate change throughout the design and implementation of climate change strategies and national development plans. In particular, it is important to begin assessing the gendered implications of climate change and take necessary actions at the initial design phase, rather than waiting until later stages of implementation. The participation of all members of society, including men, women and children, is vital to sound decision-making and to successful adaptation that promotes equitable human development and the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals. Equal participation will allow all participants’ voices to be heard and for their needs and knowledge to be included in climate change adaptation policy and decision-making. Only then will adaptation planning achieve maximum benefits for society. UNDP strongly supports the promotion of gender equality, women’s empowerment and the inclusion of women in climate change planning and decision-making.
On hehalf of Climate forum, Ms Dankelman stressed the key lessons to be learned from the Forum:
Climate change is not gender-neutral and, therefore, climate information and services cannot be gender-neutral either. Women and men drive and are impacted by climate change in distinct, gendered ways and differences also exist in their roles as carriers, providers and users of climate and weather knowledge and information.
There is a strong call for gender mainstreaming in the Global Framework for Climate Services and for the full participation of women professionals and local women, in meteorological and climate entities and fora.The need to make climate information user-friendly is urgent.
The Forum experts and participants concluded that the proposed Global Framework for Climate Services should reflect a gender equality perspective in all its components, namely:
Observation and monitoring. Involvement of local communities, particularly local women in
environmental change and climate observations, and provision of adequate preparation and training of women and men is necessary for their full participation as providers and users of climate information;
Research and modelling: Gender parity and equal participation of women researchers in climate
research should be ensured at national, regional and international level. Enhance the role of social scientists and the human dimension in climate research;
Climate service information system. Information on gender aspects of climate and health, energy, water and agriculture for mitigation and adaptation, particularly through the collection of sex disaggregated data, at both the country and regional levels needs to be enhanced. National statistics divisions should be trained in sex-disaggregated data collection, in collaboration with UN agencies, and legal guarantees for the regular and continuous production of a minimum set of gender specific data in situations of climate change, should be promoted; and
Climate services application programme. Recognizing the level of knowledge and taking into
account the realities of access to information for women, it is necessary not only to ensure accessibility and benefits from climate information for scientists and decision makers in all regions, but particularly for local communities, especially local women.
The Gender and Climate Forum further recommended:
User-oriented information. Climate information and practical prediction services, including those designed by users is important to assist in empowering local women; and
Outreach and capacity-building: It is important to ensure and support outreach and capacity building for a broad user community, including local women and men of different age groups.
Dr Seager highlighted the importance of linking the physical sciences and their work on climate change to a social and gendered analysis: “Climate change is a biophysical problem that derives from, is manifested in, and will need solutions from the social realm.” Gender analysis “reveals the ways in which these things are gendered. (It) maps the importance of understanding differential positions, roles and contributions of men and women, leveraging gender-specific knowledge into successful policies, programmes and mitigation/adaptation strategies.”
She concluded that, “It is impossible to determine the full range of causes, effects and solutions to climate change without taking gender into account.” Mrs Corral said, “Innovative economic approaches that could transform the impact of climatic changes into innovative economic empowerment initiatives on mitigation and adaptation to be implemented by women and communities.” Dr.Ashbindhu Singh opined , “Climate change remains one of the most challenging issues currently facing humanity, and (sex) disaggregated data is necessary to take effective policy decisions.” This need for sex-disaggregated data is driven by the gendered nature of climate change; certain groups of women are “particularly vulnerable to environmental issues brought upon by climate change and need to be represented in statistical reports.” He noted that, although, “there is a broad understanding and acceptance of the importance of collecting age-and sex-disaggregated data, this concern is true at the global level, but is less observed at the country and regional levels.” Such data are “incomplete at this time, including in the developed world.”
An analysis carried out by Dr Singh’s team found that in Algiers “women are 5.4 times more exposed to changes in climatic conditions than men.“ Exacerbating factors, which make women more vulnerable than men, include: adult illiteracy, lack of involvement in decision-making, education, economic inactivity, income differences. Dr Singh concluded that, “the first step towards ensuring that the specific basic needs of women are addressed over the short and long term is to collect data broken down by sex and age immediately after a disaster. Separate data on men and women is necessary to identify their separate vulnerabilities.” As a result, he advocated for the creation of a composite Gender Vulnerability Index (GVI).
To promote gender equality, the following are needed,
[i]Increase participation of women in designing adaptation strategies taking into account their traditional and existing knowledge;
[ii] Promote the inclusion of gender considerations in policy and planning influenced by adaptation programming;
[iii] Promote equitable access to, distribution of, and control of benefits from resources, such as land, water;
[iv]Focus on women for livelihood diversification opportunities and provide training on jobs generated by projects;
[v] Enable equitable access to and allocation of technological and financial resources for climate change adaptation
To facilitate these gender-sensitive strategies in adaptation programming, monitoring, reporting, and evaluation should be strengthened. Attention should be paid to developing gender sensitive indicators; collecting gender-disaggregated data to inform project planning and implementation; and evaluating the impact of adaptation policies and programmes on gender using both quantitative and qualitative data.
Gender is a cross-cutting dimension of the various MDGS. A gender approach enables us to safeguard the MDGs as involving women as beneficiaries and agents of change can significantly enhance the effectiveness of various policies and plans addressing climate change. Moreover, adaptation can also be a means and an opportunity to promote gender equality and empower women.
The overall economic, social and environmental costs of climate change are substantial; this is particularly the case in natural resource- dependent regions such as Africa. Women are often
disproportionately vulnerable to the effects of climate change, a fact that, in turn, can exacerbate gender-based disparities. Adequate and sustainable financial resources are crucial in helping
communities address the monumental challenges posed by climate change. Such resources can also foster equitable development policy, including gender equality.
Gender equality is not only a fundamental human right and a core development objective, but also ‘smart economics’. Specifically, numerous studies show that women’s empowerment leads to gains in productivity, environmental sustainability and in confronting the ill effects of climate change; hence, it follows that “incorporating gender awareness and gender criteria into climate financing mechanisms and strategies would likewise constitute ‘smart climate finance’.” Yet
women do not have easy and adequate access to funds to cover weather-related losses or to avail themselves of adaptation technologies. The reasons range from cultural and social barriers in education, political participation and decision-making processes to legal restrictions on access to capital, markets and land ownership.