Climate change is a defining threat to peace and security in the 21st century – its impacts are felt by everyone, but not equally. Gender norms and power dynamics shape how women and men of different backgrounds experience or contribute to insecurity in a changing climate. Grounded in a series of case studies from research and programming experience, this report offers a comprehensive framework for understanding how gender, climate and security are inextricably linked. The report assesses entry points for integrated action across existing global agendas and suggests concrete recommendations for how policymakers, development practitioners and donors can advance three inter-related goals: peace and security, climate action and gender equality.
Case Studies
These case studies, contributed by a diverse group of researchers and practitioners, illustrate the gender dimensions of climate-related security risks in different contexts across the globe. Click through the icons on the map to read the case studies and access the original research by the contributing authors.
Gender-responsive approaches to addressing climate-related food insecurity in Ecuador, Colombia and El Salvador
The impacts of climate change, conflict and security challenges, and gender inequality converge in a number of contexts in Latin America, creating compounded risks for food security, especially for the most vulnerable groups. Climate variability and change present particular challenges for poor smallholder farmers who rely on rain-fed agriculture. At the same time, a range of security concerns, such as internal conflict in Colombia or gang violence in El Salvador and other Northern Triangle countries, limit people’s livelihood options. Long-standing and deeply rooted gender inequalities and the high rates of violence against women and girls across the region further constrain communities’ adaptive capacities, especially for poor rural and indigenous women experiencing this “triple threat”. These factors all have detrimental impacts for food and nutrition security as communities are no longer able to rely on traditional approaches to farming and income generation.
The World Food Programme (WFP) has been working in the region for decades to provide food assistance to vulnerable populations and governments. Recent food security interventions that support resilience and adaptive capacities show that such interventions can contribute to addressing interlinked climate change impacts, gender inequality and security risks.
Recent food security interventions that support resilience and adaptive capacities show that such interventions can contribute to addressing interlinked climate change impacts, gender inequality and security risks.
In Ecuador and Colombia, WFP and partners have been using gender-responsive approaches to build adaptive capacity to climate change impacts through community-based and ecosystems-based activities that help strengthen food security within indigenous communities. In El Salvador, WFP resilience-building interventions, which include the creation and rehabilitation of natural and physical assets, community-based capacity-building and the creation of income opportunities for youth, have been strengthening communities’ capacities to address climate-related shocks and manage climate risks.
Recent research conducted jointly by WFP and SIPRI in El Salvador has pointed to ways food security interventions can also contribute to building social cohesion, a key condition to preventing community violence. For example, study informants described how a women’s group leveraged institutional structures established by a food security project to develop a community fund that assists people in need, such as covering funeral costs, hospital transportation costs, or food aid to families who have lost their primary income provider.
Initial findings from these three countries highlight that the impacts of climate variability and change can aggravate livelihood challenges and gender inequalities, further fueling food insecurity and undermining community cohesion that can hold violence in check. WFP’s work offers insights into the integration of gender and social cohesion considerations into food security interventions in climate-change affected contexts, while highlighting the need for integrated approaches to gender, climate change and security.
In Freetown, Sierra Leone – a city located between mountains and the Atlantic coast – rapid urbanization, combined with poor city planning and an unforgiving topography, has resulted in the expansion of informal settlements into flood plains and up steep hillsides. At the same time, unabated deforestation and solid waste cover have significantly reduced the absorption of heavier, harsher rains and rising sea levels, resulting in an intensification of flooding and landslides. Residents of informal settlements, who live in the most exposed areas and possess the fewest resources to adapt or respond to new conditions, are extremely vulnerable to these disasters. Women are even further disadvantaged, as discriminatory norms and power structures disproportionately limit their access to social, economic and political structures. In 2019, women had fewer than three years of schooling on average and held only 12 percent of parliamentary seats, according to the Women, Peace and Security Index.
Yet findings reveal that despite the gender gap, women in Freetown are carving paths to inclusion in local governance across two key modes of engagement, through which they are building resilience to climate-related security risks in the city’s most vulnerable corners. First, women are seeking formal representation in city government. In 2018, Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr became the first woman elected as mayor in 40 years – serving as one of only three women local council heads nationally (out of 22). Climate change and environment have been at the center of her Transform Freetown policy agenda. Her data-driven and participatory approach to governance – setting and measuring clear environmental targets and holding regular consultations with city residents, including in informal settlements – have helped her to gain legitimacy with city residents.
Second, women are engaged in community-based organizations and civil society networks, especially in informal settlements. The Federation for Urban and Rural Poor (FEDURP), a women-led network of more than 3,000 people, is organized through small savings and loans groups. Saving and loans groups serve two core functions: they provide households with financial security and they mobilize community action. Once involved in a savings group, network members take on other tasks such as carrying out data collection in their communities – which helps identify risk exposure – or training community members on flood and disaster management. FEDURP has become an important partner in the implementation of the Transform Freetown Agenda, demonstrating the power for inclusive governance.
Gender-responsive development projects in informal settlements are making important contributions to supporting the empowerment of women in local decision-making processes and bridging the gap between informal and formal structures of governance. The “Pull Slum Pan Pipul” project for example (in English, “take the slum from the people”), aims to improve the well-being of residents of informal settlements. Testimonies from beneficiaries suggest that project interventions that have improved the livelihoods of women in slums in turn have enabled women to engage in decision-making processes in their homes and communities, including related to disaster risk management. This project and others have also supported sustained dialogue between community-based leaders and city government officials, setting the foundation for inclusive local governance structures.
Even in post-conflict societies where women continue to face highly discriminatory norms, climate change and environmental issues can provide an important entry point for engaging women in local governance at different levels.
Systematic evidence of the impacts of the above-mentioned initiatives for increasing resilience to climate-related security risks has not yet been measured. However, findings demonstrate that that even in post-conflict societies where women continue to face highly discriminatory norms, climate change and environmental issues can provide an important entry point for engaging women in local governance at different levels.
Northern Nigeria has experienced significant conflict in the past ten years. At the same time, changing climate – manifested in an increase in temperature and the unpredictability of rainfall – has significantly affected the predominantly agrarian populations across the region. Two recent case studies based on empirical research examining the interaction of gender, climate change and security in the Middle Belt region and in northeastern Nigeria have shown that not only are gender roles impacted by this combination of dynamics, but that norms of masculinity and femininity have also driven violence.
Inter-communal violence in the Middle Belt region is generally considered to be caused by farmer-pastoralist conflict. Factors including population growth, allocation of grazing land to farmers, and increasing identity-based politics have altered previously largely positive interactions against a backdrop of changing climate. The unpredictability of rainfall has affected farming, pasture and water sources and made livelihoods more precarious. Reduced ability to absorb shocks, such as the destruction of crops or the death of cattle, has increased the stakes in confrontations. This violence has, in turn, contributed to a change in migration modalities, whereby young men are increasingly moving alone with their cattle, leaving families behind for their safety.
Masculinities, the desire to protect family wealth tied up in cattle, the intense stress experienced by these young men and the lack of family support, intensify conflict dynamics.
The violence itself also has gendered dimensions, with the crisis point often being conflict between young male pastoralists and women in farming communities. Conflict sites include farmlands, which women farmers report pastoralists are more likely to encroach on if a woman is present, as well as water points, when women go to fetch water at the same time cattle is watered. Rape is perpetrated by both farmer and pastoralist men. Attacks, including sexual violence, against women heighten conflict as norms of protective masculinity impel men to retaliate when “their women” have been attacked.
Northeast Nigeria, for its part, has been the theater of contestation between armed opposition groups (AOGs, commonly known as Boko Haram) and the state for the past decade. Land that is both secure and fertile is insufficient for all populations to pursue livelihoods, resulting in areas of higher population density and reduced resilience to variations in climate. Communities are also experiencing increasing tensions and degrading social cohesion, relationships and networks.
Young men, recruited into and forced to join AOGs and community militias, are often stigmatized and feared as perpetrators of violence. Conversely women, often seen as innocent victims, can choose to join AOGs to escape the patriarchal norms of mainstream society, particularly given the lack of alternative livelihood options. At the same time, with many men detained, killed, fighting or having left them behind in search of work elsewhere, women are finding ways to provide for their families in sharp contrast to pre-existing gender norms of breadwinner masculinity. However, this increased resilience is far from uniform, as particular groups of women, such as women with disabilities, face intersecting forms of marginalization, lesser access to capital and reduced social networks due to stigma.
The research shows how gender norms play significant roles in driving violence and communities’ resilience to climate change. The combination of climate change and insecurity has both changed gender norms and had differential impacts based on age, gender, disability, ethnic and religious background and other identity markers. Much of this analysis of political, economic and social dynamics tends to be missing from government policy and programming interventions, with corresponding reduced effectiveness.
For decades, Chadian populations have faced recurring droughts and severe food shortages, politico-military instability and subsequent population displacements, as well as rising food prices. Climate change, including increasing droughts, extreme rainfall and flooding, has amplified cascading threats to people’s security by exacerbating livelihood and food insecurity. This has increased competition over limited land and water resources and led to outbreaks of violence, as well as the risk of social tensions and recruitment into armed groups, particularly in the Lake Chad region. This context has aggravated the risk of violence against women and adolescent girls, particularly in areas where basic services are lacking or non-existent, where social development policies are seldom implemented and where customary laws clash with the rights of children and women.
Empirical evidence collected as part of the Building Resilience and Adaptation to Climate Extremes and Disasters (BRACED) programme, in collaboration with Oxfam Intermón and Concern Worldwide, shows that at least a third of women and adolescent girls in Chad face severe violations of their rights and violence on a daily basis. Experiences of child, early and forced marriage, denial of access and control over resources, eviction of one’s home and sexual violence within their household, are all examples of violence against women and girls that impact negatively on the ability of survivors to secure their livelihoods, their health and their rights.
“Everyday violence” against women and girls creates a negative cycle, undermining households’ and communities’ capacities to adapt to environmental changes which – in turn – reinforces gender-based violence and discriminatory practices. For example, the practice of denying women’s access to and control over resources creates economic stress for the entire family. Economic insecurity means families are less able to keep their children in school, making adolescent girls more vulnerable to early marriage and young men more vulnerable to being enlisted in armed groups, and driving male migration within and outside of Chad. The consequences are detrimental for resilience capacities, reinforcing women’s lack of safety and undermining social cohesion in communities of origin.
“Everyday violence” against women and girls creates a negative cycle, undermining households’ and communities’ capacities to adapt to environmental changes which – in turn – reinforces gender-based violence and discriminatory practices.
Women and girls are often the target recipients of humanitarian aid and development projects that aim to increase their economic resources, but the factors that sustain their exclusion, tolerate discriminatory norms and prevent their involvement in decision-making are rarely or only partially addressed. Ultimately, programmes intending to improve people’s resilience to climate risks and disasters must address the causes and the impacts of violence against women and girls, particularly if they aim at building peace and security. Interventions that support adolescents’ access to sexual and reproductive healthcare, maternal healthcare, education and information about their rights constitute priority entry points in Chad.
Egypt’s rapid population growth and extreme water scarcity make the country highly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. The country’s long Mediterranean coastline is already experiencing the consequences of sea level rise, including saltwater intrusion, soil salinization and deterioration of crop quality. In a country where 95 percent of freshwater resources are generated outside its territory, any change to water availability can have major consequences for food and energy security, as well as employment, housing, sanitation, education and health care, heightening risks of social tension and political instability.
This situation constitutes a particularly serious threat for women, who are marginalized in economic, social and political spheres. One third of adult women in Egypt are estimated to be illiterate, as compared to 15 percent of adult men, severely limiting their opportunities for employment. Agriculture employs 45 per cent of all women in the labor force in Egypt, but women only own 5.2 percent of the land. Women also face high levels of sexual and gender-based violence, especially in the most impoverished urban neighborhoods. Unequal inheritance rights and customary practices that discriminate against women contribute to limited asset ownership, more unstable earnings and higher food and water insecurity.
Policy responses to the climate crisis in Egypt have so far concerned environmentalists and gender equality advocates alike. As the rural population grows, land is being fragmented into increasingly smaller plots, a pattern that hinders the organization and efficient use of farm resources and exacerbates socio-economic strains. Given their marginalized situation, women are particularly affected these compounding factors. This is starkly illustrated in the case of the Salam Canal – Egypt’s largest land reclamation and irrigation project – which involved the construction of irrigation and drainage infrastructure, land preparation for farming and the development of settler villages, which often resulted in violent clashes with existing populations. The settlers were selected through a formalized application process, but while a quota of at least 20 percent female settlers was mandated, only a handful of female applicants were identified. Many women later reported ceding control over land to male family members, in conformity with gendered roles and expectations.
Recognizing the co-benefits of women’s empowerment and climate resilience, and supporting synergistic action to realize them, constitutes an important avenue for sustaining peace in Egypt.
Recognizing the co-benefits of women’s empowerment and climate resilience, and supporting synergistic action to realize them, constitutes an important avenue for sustaining peace in Egypt. In Al-Zarayeb, for example, a neighborhood of informal settlements on the outskirts of Cairo’s Mokattam Hills, community-based organizations like the Association for the Protection of the Environment (APE) have taken action to simultaneously empower women and respond to the environmental crisis. At the time of writing, the APE is working with 250 women members who count on each other for protection and receive assistance securing an environmentally-friendly source of income, education – mostly basic literacy classes – and daycare support for their children.
Pastoral livestock production has long been an important livelihood in Africa’s drylands, allowing nomadic communities to adapt to challenging climatic conditions characterized by long periods of drought and highly variable rainfall. In North Kordofan state, Sudan, however, established migratory routes and pastoralist grazing land have come under threat in recent years as a result of environmental and climactic changes, the expansion of mechanized agriculture, and conflict and insecurity.
More pastoralist women and girls are remaining in villages throughout the year, while men and boys continue to be – at least seasonally – mobile. This new practice has an impact on the social composition of local villages, resulting in increasingly “feminized” communities.
Research documenting these changes in and around Al Rahad – a locality situated along North Kordofan’s southeastern border that acts as a major crossroads for several pastoralist groups – has found that pastoralist communities are shifting their traditional migratory patterns in different ways to adapt to new conditions. Among the three prevalent ethnic groups – the Baggara, Shanabla, and Kababish – two distinct migratory patterns have emerged: some groups are no longer migrating at all or are moving much smaller distances, essentially settling in villages around Al Rahad. Other groups are continuing to migrate but have adjusted their traditional routes to the new environmental and security challenges, by avoiding migration to deteriorating grazing lands in the north or sending only men to graze large animals in South Kordofan, an area with higher levels of insecurity. Although the research recorded a diversity of experiences, it highlighted a common trend: more pastoralist women and girls are remaining in villages throughout the year, while men and boys continue to be – at least seasonally – mobile. This new practice has an impact on the social composition of local villages, resulting in increasingly “feminized” communities.
Shifts in livelihood practices and the social composition of villages have important implications for gender norms, as well as for social, political, and economic dynamics. The research found that these changes are associated with new risks and vulnerabilities for both pastoral men and pastoral women. For example, the region is experiencing increasing levels of conflict between pastoralist groups and farming communities over access to land or other natural resources. Men and boys who continue to migrate move through highly insecure areas and are at risk of experiencing violence, as well as fueling new tensions with local farming communities to access grazing land. Women who remain behind in Al Rahad’s villages are faced with heavy burdens to fulfil their traditional responsibilities and as well to meet new demands, such as generating new forms of income for the family in the absence of men.
At the same time, the research underscores opportunities for empowering women and promoting positive peace as livelihood and settlement patterns shift. Study participants noted that close proximity to health centres, highways and a more settled lifestyle had made receiving health care – especially reproductive healthcare – more accessible to pastoralist women. A more settled lifestyle was also said to allow for more frequent interactions – and relationship-building – between women from pastoral and farming communities, such as at markets or health centres, opening up new opportunities to strengthen social cohesion between groups. Some pastoral women also noted that exposure to settled communities may be having a positive impact on marriage practices, citing that women were increasingly consulted before marriage.
While providing a rare glimpse into the lives and livelihoods of pastoralist women on the frontlines of climate change, the study’s findings reinforce that pastoralist experiences are dynamic and complex, and are often informed by multiple identities, including gender, ethnicity, economic or social status, migratory patterns and culture, among others.
An increasingly complex and nuanced understanding of the interplay between the livelihood impacts of climate change, conflict and security is emerging for the Sahel, a region known as “ground zero” for climate change. Less well documented to date is the degree to which climate change and insecurity are contributing to important social shifts, particularly in the composition of rural communities. This includes a marked feminization of the resident population of some local communities that are on the frontlines of these dynamics. While increasing the economic burden on women from all social groups, and exposing them to further risks of violence, these shifts also provide opportunities to strengthen women’s leadership for conflict prevention and resolution, and to empower them to increase community resilience.
A pilot project undertaken by UNEP, UN Women and UNDP provided important insights into these dynamics in the locality of Al Rahad in the Sudanese state of North Kordofan – a community, like many in the Sahel, beset by climate-related environmental degradation and increasing conflicts over natural resources, as well as spill-over insecurity linked to the protracted conflict on the border with South Sudan. The project undertook targeted interventions to support women from all groups to exercise their agency in local planning and decision-making processes governing the use of natural resources and to strengthen their role in the prevention and resolution of natural resource-based conflicts. Remarkably, it succeeded not only in increasing women’s participation in natural resource governance, conflict prevention and resolution, but also in shifting perceptions of women’s leadership, capacities and contributions in building a sustainable peace.
The project demonstrated that natural resource governance and management interventions are a strong entry point for women’s empowerment in peacebuilding. In situations where women are typically excluded from decision-making, natural resources can provide a “neutral” entry point for engaging in political dialogue and mediation of conflicts, as women typically derive legitimacy from their traditional resource-related roles that is not conferred to them on other issues. Sustainable natural resource management also represents a key opportunity for women’s economic empowerment in a context where sustainable alternative livelihoods are needed due to the impacts of a changing climate. Specifically targeting women in the development of climate adaptive livelihoods – and supporting them to organize economically – ensures not only income gains for women, but the resilience and stability of entire communities. Finally, natural resource interventions can provide important platforms for cooperation for women from opposing groups that contribute to strengthening social cohesion.
In situations where women are typically excluded from decision-making, natural resources can provide a “neutral” entry point for engaging in political dialogue and mediation of conflicts, as women typically derive legitimacy from their traditional resource-related roles that is not conferred to them on other issues.
Due to its geography, Pakistan is exceptionally exposed to climate-related hazards, and has experienced an increasing number of climate-related disasters over the last decades, including severe floods and droughts which have had lasting impacts on infrastructure, livelihoods and resilience, particularly in urban areas. The most vulnerable, who rely on natural resources and informal work, are trapped in a cycle of economic, social and political marginalization that is exacerbated with every disaster.
Pakistan’s deeply embedded patriarchal norms – at all levels of society and institutions – influence how men and women perceive and experience climate change impacts within the current security landscape. Findings from research across two provinces – Sindh and Punjab – point to some important trends in urban areas. Pakistan is urbanizing at a rapid rate, but decent livelihood opportunities and public services are not following suit, with the result that life in the city is often precarious on many fronts. The impacts of climate change are exacerbating this precarity and contributing to domestic violence and the formation of non-state armed groups.
Men and women are increasingly unable to live up to their prescribed gender roles which, in some cases, is resulting in domestic or communal violence.
The research finds that first, men and women are increasingly unable to live up to their prescribed gender roles which, in some cases, is resulting in domestic or communal violence. For example, damages incurred from extreme flooding have been found to keep men – who are typically daily wage or contract workers – at home, resulting in loss of income and preventing them from fulfilling their prescribed roles as breadwinners. Both women and men explained that the anxieties and frustrations associated with this lack of fulfilment of their socialized responsibilities could lead to domestic violence.
Second, women illustrated that they faced increased structural oppression as a result of certain aspects of climate change, such as extreme water shortages. Many women are expected to continue to manage the household without problems, even with droughts affecting household water security in some of Pakistan’s biggest cities. Women narrated experiences of tending to sick children with no resources and of disappointing their husbands or other men in the household. Women explained that they experienced physical forms of domestic violence for either failing to manage the existing water in the house, or for breaking norms around women’s mobility by venturing out to secure new sources.
Finally, water and energy shortages that have been exacerbated with climate change have been associated in some cases with the mobilization of men into non-state armed groups. For example, in Karachi, a network of informal water providers, branded a “water mafia,” has emerged. This group is reportedly using water scarcity to gain power by intensifying water shortages through illegal extraction, and then selling the water to communities via private tanker. The related frustrations have led to community violence and fighting between the “water mafia” and the local population.
After decades of violent conflict, Nepal’s civil war between the then Maoist party and the government of Nepal ended with the signing of a peace agreement in 2006. However, in the years leading up to the signing of a new constitution in 2015 and subsequent elections for a federal system of government in 2017, socio-political tensions in the Karnali River Basin, in western Nepal, often resulted in protests and, at times, in violent confrontations. Tensions around the inclusion of minority groups in governance structures and unequal access to natural resources manifested in growing mistrust among different ethnic and indigenous groups and between local communities and the government, the undercurrents of which are still felt today.
The impacts of climate change in western Nepal – including higher temperatures, rainfall variability, and the melting of glaciers – threaten to further undermine this fragile socio-economic fabric. A baseline study conducted to inform the design of a UNEP project addressing climate-related security risks in the region found that these changing dynamics have important intersectional gender dimensions, which may pose particular risks – as well as opportunities – for women’s empowerment.
First, constraints on access to natural resources shaped by changing governance models and perceived insecurity are exacerbated by climate change impacts. For instance, much of the forest land – which covers 61 percent of Kailali District and 39 percent of Bardia District – remains under jurisdiction of state government and continues to be characterized by a heavy presence of security personnel, limiting community access to and use of forest resources. At the same time, unpredictable and uneven rainfall creates new challenges, such as increased risks of flooding and less productive agricultural outputs. In consultations for the baseline study, women noted feeling particularly vulnerable to these impacts, as higher levels of food insecurity created fertile ground for domestic violence and greater burdens of care, as is often seen after natural disasters.
As a result of constrained access to and reliability of natural resources, community members reported that out-migration of men was on the increase. Seasonal migration of men to India has long been a primary source of livelihood for people in this region. However, as agriculture becomes less reliable due to unpredictable and changing rainfall patterns, men are extending their stays in India. Community members also reported new migration destinations, including both cities within Nepal and Gulf countries, for men and women seeking alternative income sources. Women reported shouldering increased burdens and experiencing higher levels of insecurity as the sole providers for their families in ever more challenging environments. However, migration was also noted to be an effective adaptation strategy, providing pathways for individuals – mainly men – to support their families with alternative income sources.
Women reported shouldering increased burdens and experiencing higher levels of insecurity as the sole providers for their families in ever more challenging environments. However, migration was also noted to be an effective adaptation strategy, providing pathways for individuals – mainly men – to support their families with alternative income sources.
Despite the gender-related risks associated with climate change and security in Nepal, women have remained largely sidelined from decision-making processes. Barriers to inclusion are especially high for female members of the Tharu ethnic minority, who face multiple levels of marginalization as women and members of a traditionally marginalized caste. Interventions seeking to address these risks should enhance the leadership and technical capacities of women at local levels and work to strengthen the evidence base on climate change, governance, and gender through local level knowledge generation, ensuring that the voices of the most marginalized are elevated in consultations and dialogue with affected communities.
The Asia Pacific is a highly diverse region politically, economically, socio-culturally and environmentally. This diversity amplifies the challenges of addressing climate-related risks in a historically “crisis-prone” region, especially as the Asia Pacific lags in meeting Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) targets in key areas of climate action, natural resource management and environmental protection.
Drawing on evidence from key-informant interviews and focus group discussions in three countries in the region – the Philippines, Cambodia and Vanuatu – recent research finds that “gender-lite” approaches within climate change and disaster programming weaken the transformative potential of integrating gender perspectives across risk mapping, analysis and response. In the distinct security context of the Asia-Pacific, climate change is one of several interrelated “everyday” insecurities, along with pre-existing gender inequalities and compounded risks from poverty, protracted conflicts, land dispossession and local or community-level resource disputes.
All three countries have promulgated frameworks that incorporate gender equality goals within national climate change and disaster risk reduction agendas. Yet, the transformative potential of gender analysis and mainstreaming commitments is largely undermined by “box-ticking” approaches. Dominant national and global climate risk analyses remain partial – or worse, flawed – because they are ultimately unable to comprehensively respond to where, when, how and what multiple risks overlap.
“Gender-lite” approaches within climate change and disaster programming weaken the transformative potential of integrating gender perspectives across risk mapping, analysis and response.
The findings make a strong case for urgently moving beyond “gender-lite” to gender-responsive implementation across climate risk mapping and response. A key step is to begin re-assessing existing national frameworks and plans based on everyday and traditional knowledge as legitimate forms of climate risk expertise of individuals and communities at the crossroads of different crises, particularly disasters and conflicts. Processes should – by design – promote women’s active participation and leadership at all levels of planning, beginning with developing women’s expertise at basic community or village governance structures.
Indigenous Papuans on the western half of the island of New Guinea, have experienced intersecting environmental, social, and political crises, within the context of a movement seeking self-determination. These ongoing crises are exacerbated by longstanding grievances over the Grasberg mine (which contains significant reserves of copper and gold), and environmental degradation caused by the mining and palm oil sectors, as well as the legacy of colonialism on the allocation of land and resources.
These challenges are compounded by the impacts of changing weather patterns, which have put additional stress on the region’s rapidly depleting natural resource base, contributing to the loss of livelihoods and food security challenges. This has created a new dependency on imported foods, rapidly replacing traditional subsistence living. Additionally, unusually heavy rainfalls frequently cause floods and landslides. Such disasters have killed many, left entire communities displaced and severely damaged food crops.
Indigenous Papuan women, whose traditional roles include providing food for their families through small plot agriculture and forest management, have been disproportionately affected by the impacts of environmental degradation, exacerbated by a changing climate. This has compounded other vulnerabilities linked to insecurity, including rampant sexual and gender-based violence and marginalization, especially among displaced populations.
While Papuan women play a key role in caring for the community’s food gardens and forests, they possess no rights of ownership to the land and natural resources within traditional structures. When these lands are lost, by force or when they are sold by male family members to extractive industries, whole communities are displaced. This has a profound impact on indigenous women, whose native lands are deeply embedded in their cultural and ethnic identity, and who are dependent on access to land to carry out their prescribed roles. Displacement also puts women at further risk of violence.
The Papuan experience shows how the exploitation of natural resources can drive violence, and how climate change can compound insecurity, leading to severe livelihood impacts on indigenous women that have trickle-down impacts on families and communities.
Despite the emerging recognition of the substantial link between climate change and the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) framework, the intersections of climate change, environmental degradation, resource extraction, conflict and violence against women remain largely absent from the Security Council’s agenda. The Papuan experience shows how the exploitation of natural resources can drive violence, and how climate change can compound insecurity, leading to severe livelihood impacts on indigenous women that have trickle-down impacts on families and communities. Twenty years after the adoption of UNSCR 1325, it is critical that the gender dimensions of environmental degradation, resource extraction, indigenous land rights and climate change, be fully integrated into the WPS agenda.
This project was made possible by the generous support of the Governments of Finland and Norway.
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The views expressed in this volume are those of the author(s), including independent researchers and thematic experts with no affiliation to the United Nations, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations Environment Programme, UN Women, UNDP or UNDPPA/PBSO. The designations employed and the presentations do not imply the expressions of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the United Nations Environment Programme, UN Women, UNDP or UNDPPA/PBSO concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or its authority, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries. This publication may be reproduced in whole or in part and in any form for educational or non-profit purposes without special permission from the copyright holder provided acknowledgement of the source is made. No use of this publication may be made for resale or for any other commercial purpose whatsoever without prior permission in writing from the United Nations Environment Programme, UN Women, UNDP and UNDPPA/PBSO.
This project was funded the by Governments of Finland and Norway; however the views expressed in this report do not necessarily reflect official policy of the Governments of Finland and Norway.
First published on 9 June 2020; revised edition on 11 June 2020
