GENDER AND CLIMATE CHANGE; Minding The Gap In Decision Making.
By Omondi Okwany
Did you know that the world today is still a
patriarchal society? Despite the efforts in science and interconnectedness, women
in some parts of the world still suffer the most as compared to men. The
Marxism theory projects that women are still in the periphery; “This school of
thought holds that women are subjected and are properties of the patriarchal
society”(Okwany, 2013). For instance, most decision making platforms,
mechanisms and institutions are still dominated by the male gender. Considering
the top political sits, women presidents and prime ministers are just a handful
in numbers. According to the feminist
school of thought, the security of an individual is as equal as the security of
the state; this theory grew from the end of cold war to address the issues of
political, social and economic equality for women; this was the period of
emancipation of the mind towards gender and improvement of women lives, (Baylis et al., 2013Pg.
259). Today there is much evidence that women stand to be
affected the most due to risks brought by climate change like floods, sea water
rising, diseases, droughts and climate refugees catastrophe.
DECISION
MAKING ORGANS are the
most fundamental way of achieving climate justice. Women are still subjected
when it comes to various decision making institutions. It is shocking to say
the United Nations (UN) has 193 state members(UNOV, 2015) and the United Nation Framework Convention on Climate
Change (UNFCCC) has 195 member states yet only 28 member states give women the
right to own land/property. Since the UNFCCC entered into force in 1994 (UNFCCC, 2014), there was never any mention to gender not even in
the outside events; nevertheless COP7 did call for gender balance, (Olson, 2014). It was until Conference of Party number 18 (COP18)
which came up with gender day and the role women play in addressing climate
change, (Hemmati, 2005).
Women have been locked out when it comes to the
science of climate change. “IPCC is providing the science base for climate
related policy making. It would be very helpful indeed if they started to
consider gender issues more systematically and thus provide a scientific basis
for gender mainstreaming climate related policy”.(Hemmati, 2005).
.
Women are not only vulnerable when it comes to climate
change but also a tremendous agent when it comes adaptation and mitigation;
considering the small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) they are the third
largest world market after China and India (Srinivasan, 2004). Women also tend to drive most of the house hold
spending and decision making (Okwany, 2013); this is a huge power indeed that can influence
policy formulation and conduct in realizing climate justice, yet they are still
under represented in institutional processes like UNFCCC. The Environmental Gender Index (EGI) did
analyse 73 countries and found out that by 2014, women were highly represented
at the NGO level and not governmental level at the UNFCCC
In comparison, men tend to take more risks than women;
this gives them a stepping stone to decision making environments, (Jianakoplos and
Bernasek, 1998). African Union (AU) has developed mechanisms like
Committee of African Heads of States and Government on Climate Change
(CAHOASCC), African Ministerial Committee on Environment (AMCEN) and African
Groups of Negotiators (AGN) for building an African position towards conference
of parties (COP). These mechanisms have low representation of African women. Considering
the CAHOASCC, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (the president of Liberia) is the only
African female. The 15th ordinary session of AMCEN held on the 2nd
to 6th March 2015 was dominated by male environmental ministers.
ADAPTATION
AND MITIGATION currently
has 50 decision under UNFCCC. Adaptation takes the lead in gender inclusive
language, mitigation has the fewest decisions and no guidance for directing gender
sensitive actions; The Lima work Programme on gender is one of the milestone as
far as gender work is concern (AN and NAMPg. 13). Currently the UNFCCC decisions addressing gender are
12 in adaptation, 4 in mitigation basically on REDD+, 8 in finance one of them
being Green climate fund on gender policy, 4 in technology and 6 in capacity
building (Burns et al., 2014). About 40% of the latest 128 decisions from the Intended
Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) mentioned women and gender while
60% did not(Burns et al., 2014).
LOSS
AND DAMAGE projects
that women suffer the most when it
comes to climate change disaster and risk related issues. A study carried out
in 141 countries points at evidence of gender difference in deaths from
disaster are directly linked to women’s economic and social rights. “For every
one man who died of disaster, four women died”, (Sudmeier-Rieux and
Ash, 2009). Women’s rights are crucial. It is not only about climate
change but climate justice, which is a moral concern.
Climate change leads to risks like floods, droughts
and migration. The world poor face the risk of floods, drought and climate
refugees; these population are mostly women, (Denton, 2002). In the global south countries like the African
continent and India, women spend 40% of their daily energy in fetching water. Most
of these developing countries depend highly on agriculture; risks brought by
climate change affect women the most as they account for 80% in the agriculture
sector (Denton, 2002).
Women are particularly susceptible to water-borne
diseases. “About 50 million women become pregnant in malaria-endemic countries”,
(Dellicour et al.,
2010). An estimation of 100, 000 and 200,000 women and
infants respectively die as a result of malaria infection during pregnancy, (Hartman et al., 2010). Poverty and dependency of rain fed agriculture put
women at risk for they are mostly small scale famers.
ENERGY
sector is also
important in mitigating climate change yet the energy industry remains one of
the most gender imbalanced sector in the world. The renewable energy investment
reached $260 billion globally in 2014; this went up from $40 billion in 2011.
In 2013, investment in renewable energy surpassed investment in fossil fuel and
nuclear power. The renewable energy sector attracts more jobs than fossil fuel
sector today (Kammen et al., 2004); and women still face the challenge in employment. Energy
policies often leave gender consideration, while gender policies do not tackle
energy. There is limited knowledge on how to address gender inequality in
energy policies and planning. There is as well lack of sex-disaggregated data
on energy to inform decision making. COP21 in Paris will cover a big step on
the road to women in decision making on energy; the 7th of December
2015 will host a side event on gender and energy at COP21.
As the world gather in Paris COP21 to create
international policies on climate change it is important to note that women are
still subject when it comes to high level decision making yet they are mostly
the implementers of policy. The science of politics puts it that there is a
mutual relation between policy formulation and conduct, therefore implementers
should and must be around the decision making table. A close look at the Paris
outcome will be interesting for it will make history of our time.
Editor: Namboka Belinda
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