Gender and Climate Change: A Climate Equity Vision for now

Climate change and its impacts exacerbate inequalities in a society. Especially in a country like India, the impacts of climate change are felt more severely by socially, economically and politically marginalised populations.

Women, particularly those belonging to marginalised communities, are disproportionately affected by the climate crisis. Despite this, women’s voices and issues are absent from a large number of policy measures focusing on mitigating climate change and adapting to its impacts. 

Given the gendered impacts of climate change, there is an urgent need to build a framework focussing on women’s vulnerability induced by climate change. To this end, Asar Social Impact Advisors, India, published this framework on April 25, 2023. It has been designed by Supriya Tirkey. The Gender and Climate Programme at Asar Social Impact Advisors builds networks to bolster women’s leadership and resilience against climate change. This framework was built under this Programme.

The Gender Transformative Climate Framework presented in this 8-page document was developed in two phases. In the first phase, a draft framework was conceptualised which linked the basic causes of gender inequalities to underlying climate-induced vulnerabilities. Based on the vulnerabilities, key strategies were developed that intersect mitigation, resilience and adaptation interventions. These strategies were then mapped to relevant national government schemes and potential impact areas. 

In the second phase, the draft framework was shared with various stakeholders working on different areas in the realm of gender and climate change. Structured interactions (both online and in-person) were also held with them to get their inputs based on which the final framework was created.

The primary shift that this strategy calls for is integrating women and marginalised groups (especially indigenous groups) into decision- making at all levels that would help improve both mitigation and adaptation policies. This, the document suggests, should be promoted through innovative capacity-building and empowerment measures, following a rights-based, transformative approach with a view to achieving inclusive governance over time. 

The Gender Transformative Climate Framework document will evolve as Asar along with its partners and networks put these interventions into across locations. The learnings from these will be incorporated into the framework.

Focus by Ankita Bhatkhande.

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