Pretty (Useless) Words on Gender and Climate at COP27

Whenever a world conference convenes to address a problem like violence against women, food insecurity or, say, climate change, you’ll likely find some women in the room, just not too many on the panels or speakers’ lists — at least not in any kind of proportionate number to either population or the impact of whatever crisis is at hand on women and girls. At least that’s been my experience at international human rights convenings over the years.

At COP27, the UN climate conference in Egypt, which ends today, it appears to have been the same old, same old. The reason this is so disappointing is because when it comes to the climate crisis, women face some of the worst consequences of global warming, yet have little say in how to change it.

The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) laid out an updated gender action plan in June. The plan’s framework includes pretty words that sound nice but, historically, have had little action to back them up. An example, which sounds more like a wish than anything else, is the part where it “recognizes that the full, meaningful and equal participation and leadership of women in all aspects of the UNFCCC process and in national and local-level climate policy and action is vital for achieving long-term climate goals.”

“Recognition” does not equal change, or inclusion. And there is not a lot of hope that any such statements will alter the reality for women, who are still not given equal participation and remain locked into patriarchal societies in which they are rarely able to work toward bettering their own environment.

“Gender equality is the crucial missing link in the achievement of all our grand plans,” writes Sima Bahous, the executive director of UN Women.

As has been shown again and again, developing countries and vulnerable populations — often women and girls — bear the brunt of climate change despite contributing to it the least. They lose money from failing crops and dying oceans, or are sickened by pollutive extraction industries that are exacerbating the crisis. They have to walk ever farther to find firewood and water for their families.

Advocates have been fighting for years to get these gendered issues on the world agenda.

In what sounds like a positive note, this week at COP27, governments pledged to provide funding for people who have suffered climate-related financial losses.

“Now that we have a foot in the door, we must smash it open and secure a decision from parties at COP27 to establish a ‘loss and damage’ finance facility,” said Fanny Petitbon, advocacy manager at CARE France. “COP27 should deliver critical support for populations, especially women and girls in the global South, who bear the brunt of climate impacts.”

Still, advocacy groups say that all countries but one, Austria, have chosen to redirect money from what would have been financing for emissions reductions in order to fund these deficits. It’s a game of shuffling around funding that, unfortunately, equals net zero (a very different kind of “net zero” than what governments are aiming for on emissions).

“The finance must be new and additional and should not be counted towards adaptation finance, as the latter is anyway underfunded,” said Sven Harmeling, CARE’s climate justice global policy lead.

Also, some of this loss and damage coverage would come in the form of insurance. But women and impoverished people may be unable to pay high premiums, and companies are not guaranteed to pay out enough money to cover losses.

Such policies “may come with unfavorable financial terms that insufficiently reflect the need for main emitters to take their responsibility, so insurance approaches need to be carefully designed to match pro-poor principles and gender considerations,” Harmeling said.

Another CARE official told ReliefWeb that participants at the conference “spend hours on process fights and finance discussions.”

Not a surprise, but between endless bureaucracy, infighting and a lack of representation, there does not appear to be much tangible action that has come out of COP27 to improve the lives of women. And, as Bahous put it: “Without gender equality, there is no climate justice.”