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A recent UNDP report on climate change and gender showed that 80% were being displaced by the UNDP. Climate crisisFemales are more common than males. This means that there is a responsibility for girls and women to shoulder the consequences of climate change.
Not only does it lead to women being forced from their homes, but it also causes them to marry, further disempowering girls. Women and girls can be involved in solving the climate crisis. This could lead to food security, zero hunger and better education.
The same report also states that it will take women 135 years to bridge the gap in gender inequality, which means it will also take more than a century to achieve climate justice – because without gender equality, there is no climate justice.
Women and girls can help and work together to tackle the defining issue in our time. All we need is a safe place to do this.
The I Lead Climate Action Initiative prompted a 30-day period for activism. It was evident that women all over the world have been supporting climate action in different ways, despite their toxic environment.
Through our projects we have come to understand that women’s lands rights are a crucial and effective carbon capturing technique. This is a decade for ecosystem restoration. Women need to play a key role if we want to achieve this. Women’s land rights have a wide reaching impact on food security, eliminating hunger and poverty, reducing gender-based violence, and on tackling climate change. We empower women and children by strengthening their land rights.
This was something I saw firsthand when one of our projects gave women access organic fertiliser from the UNDP to expand their production. Research shows that women who lack secure rights to land have limited access to credit and agricultural programming.
Likewise, our fight for the restoration of Lake Chad is also a fight to strengthen women’s rights through access to resources, such as land and water. It will reduce their daily burden and increase democracy in the area and elsewhere.
Climate action has been slow because of the limited rights of women. This barrier towards access to resources disempowers women’s ability to participate as solution makers.
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It is a violation of their fundamental rights to use women and girls as survival strategies. The end of child marriage would strengthen our girls’ rights and enable them to access education, which in turn could lead to climate solutions.
The less empowered society is the more girls and women are deprived of their rights. It’s that simple.
Oladosu Adenike, an ecofeminist leader and climate justice leader, specializes in peace and security in Africa. She’s an advocate for the restoration of Lake Chad and a green democracy.
