In Pakistan women who constitute the majority of the poor are among the most vulnerable to the detrimental impacts of climate change, particularly in rural areas. However despite that, they are also vital to solutions to the impact. The International Women’s Day, marked on March 8 this year, reiterated the need for encouraging effective action for advancing and recognising women for the invaluable significance of their role, which is vital to achieve socio-economic development goals in both developing and developed countries.
When we talk about gender dimensions in the context of the impact of climate change, that is also a recognition of the fact that climate change would affect women and men in different ways due to their different roles with regard to use of natural resources, particularly forest and water.
Like in other parts of the world, women in rural Pakistan generally assume primary responsibility for collecting water for drinking, cooking, washing, hygiene and raising small livestock. On the other hand, men use water for irrigation, livestock, farming and industries. These work-distributions connote that women and men often have divergent needs and priorities as far as water use is concerned. This knowledge is quite significant in the context of climate change.
For instance, in drought-prone areas affected by desertification time consumed by water-collection will increase, as women will have to travel greater distances to find water. But this is the time that could be spent in school, earning an income or participating in public/economic life. Walking long distances to fetch water can expose women to different health issues and harassment or sexual assault. What is awful to observe is that women tend to be under-represented in the decision-making on climate change at all levels in the country. This severely limits their ability to contribute and implement initiatives for mitigation and adaptation to fight negative effects of the rapidly changing weather patterns.
Women are predominantly responsible for food production, household water supply and wood-gathering for heating and cooking. We cannot, however, afford to keep women away from the processes of planning and policy, and decision-making meant for tackling the devastating impact of climate change on different sectors of economy, particularly agriculture, water and health.
There is a pressing need that the country’s planners, policy and decision-makers realise and ensure that women are an equal part of these very processes. It is imperative that contribution of women is adequately reflected in the planning and decision-making processes aimed at building the climate resilience of the country through mitigation and adaptation plans in all socio-economic sectors. Moreover, women and gender experts should play their effective part in collaboration with relevant government departments to ensure that they are well informed of the gendered dimensions of climate-sensitive sectors like agriculture, health, education and water.
In a nutshell, all segments of society need to unite for ending existing inequalities between men and women and how climate change can exacerbate these inequalities.
Being important natural resource users, women have gained knowledge and developed coping strategies over the years that give them a practical understanding of innovation and skills to adapt to the extreme weather events as well as to contribute to the solution. Nonetheless, their knowledge to cope with climate risks or the impact of climate variability on their own remains a largely untapped resource. However, utilising the practical knowledge women have for the boosting of the resilience of a country’s climate, and making women key stakeholders in the planning and decision-making processes for dealing with vagaries of climate change is indispensible.
Women are often grappled with difficulties when it comes to the general accessibility of financial resources, capacity-building activities and technologies required for building climate-resilience or coping with the effects of climate change. This often proves to be the roadblock in the way of women’s empowerment in general and their role in relation to climate change adaptation and mitigation in particular.
Different international studies have highlighted that women are very vulnerable, and most likely to be disproportionately affected by the adverse impact of climate change because they constitute the majority of the underprivileged people anywhere in the world. Women’s traditional roles as the primary users and managers of natural resources, primary caregivers, and labourers engaged in unpaid labour mean they are involved in and dependent on livelihoods and resources that are put most at risk by climate change.
We, however, need to approach gender and climate from many perspectives to ensure that women are present at all levels and dimensions of climate change policy-making, strategising and action.
The writer is the head of media, communication and advocacy section at the Ministry of Climate Change, Islamabad. He is also a media trainer, freelance climate change and development science writer