COP27: Largely Excluded from Negotiations, Women Got Together at the Panels to Share Solutions
Authored by: Alice Finno
Although women are disproportionately impacted by the climate crisis due to social, cultural, and economic factors that make them more vulnerable to climate change, they were largely absent from negotiations during COP27, proving that women remained, once again, excluded from decision-making processes despite being predominantly affected by their outcomes.
An analysis from the BBC found that less than 34 percent of country delegates at COP27 were women. The unequal representation was already clear from the first days when the inaugural photo of COP27 was released, depicting 110 world leaders, of which only seven were women. As the Women’s Environment and Development Organization confirmed, this was one of the lowest numbers of female Heads of Delegations at UN climate summits.
Nonetheless, at the official side events, there were panels with high-level female speakers focused on the interconnection between climate change and gender. Women from countries in Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe, and Latin America, shared their first-hand experience with the climate crisis.
All panelists emphasized that we need a systemic approach that includes gender in all sectors, as women have different perspectives and ideas to address the climate crisis. As the Under-Secretary-General and Associate Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme, Dr. Usha Rao-Monari, affirmed: a “business as usual approach will not work.” The Indian economic specialist added that it’s necessary to include a larger number of stakeholders in the solutions, and women are central driving forces behind climate action because, being at the frontline of this crisis, they already have the solutions to tackle it.
Josefa Leonel Correia Sacko, African Union Commissioner for Rural Economy and Agriculture, pointed out that one of the sectors most affected by climate change is agriculture, and African women constitute around 50 percent to 70 percent of the agricultural workforce, which puts them at substantial risk of losing their livelihood when climate disasters hit. Hence, Sacko said that mainstreaming gender in this sector is key. She proposed to modernize and innovate agriculture, build resilience, and engage youths and women, as they are the ones who can lead the change.
Pacifica Ogola, Secretary of the Environment and Forestry Ministry in Kenya, underlined the importance of bringing women to COPs so that they can talk explicitly about what they need from the international community to better address the climate crisis in their home countries. Ogola also advocated for educating young girls, as education is key to uplifting them: “If you don’t educate the girls, the vulnerability will be passed to the following generation.”
The Finnish politician Hanna Sarkinnen added that we need to look at and dismantle the structural barriers that stop women from fully participating in society and climate action; one of these being caregiving and household chores. “We have learned from our own history that we need to address the problem of care,” said Sarkinnen.
Maria Neira, Director of Public Health & Environment Department at the World Health Organization, focused on the need to invest in access to water, sanitation, and electricity, but also on the transition to renewable sources of energy. Since women are mostly responsible for the household and caregiving duties, water scarcity and energy poverty will increase their difficulties, forcing them to travel long distances to get water and putting them at higher risk of gender-based violence. Neira said that “we need a healthy urban planning transition,” and women are better suited to guide it.
The Executive Director of UN Women, Sima Sami Bahous, mentioned that only 0.01% of global funding goes into climate action and gender, but it is essential to increase financing and invest on women. According to Bahous, three are the areas we need to look at: women’s presence in decision-making processes, access to education and training for women and girls, and access to financing aimed toward women’s emancipation and empowerment.
Finally, both Rao-Monari and Bahous highlighted another key issue: the shortage of gender data. Women and girls are largely absent from datasets, meaning that we don’t know the actions they have taken to tackle the climate crisis, and this prevents the spread of their precious knowledge and solutions. As Rao-Monari claimed, “what is not measured is invisible,” and as many female panelists, country delegates, and youth activists have shown during COP27, women are done with being invisible.
People are dying every day because of the climate crisis, and the number of deaths will keep increasing if we don’t act. Therefore, we cannot afford to lose hope over disappointing climate agreements and stop fighting for climate justice. Despite all the obstacles put in their way, women are at the frontline of the climate crisis, standing up for their communities and being vocal on what needs to change.