Before the start of the war in Ukraine, the world was in a double emergency. On the one hand, the need for urgent and effective action to face the climate crisis and the risk of disasters. On the other hand, the imperative to overcome poverty and inequality that have been exacerbated since the Covid-19 crisis in all its expressions. As always in these cases, women and children are the most vulnerable.
Women are more vulnerable to the impact of crises, as they make up the majority of the world’s poor, are in charge of single-parent homes and are burdened with care, often have informal jobs, are more dependent on natural resources that are under threat from change. climate.
In Latin America, experience in the different crises we have faced has taught us that it is essential that women’s organizations and women themselves be at the center of the humanitarian response. However, this does not happen in practice, and we are still far from achieving gender equality and occupying power spaces on an equal footing.
In this context, the climate change crisis and gender equality are connected issues that must be tackled in a coordinated and joint way. In other words, neither will be possible on its own. Without gender equality we will not be able to tackle the climate crisis. And if we don’t tackle the climate crisis, there will be no gender equality.
This is reflected in the fact that it is women who are most at risk of not being able to guarantee their food security and that of their dependents after disasters. In many cases, they often lose their means of subsistence or have to devote themselves to caring for their sons and daughters, and for injured or sick people in their family nucleus.
Women as the engine of change
Therefore, it is essential that more and more girls and women in Latin America and the world get involved in effective actions in favor of the environment on the part of civil society organizations and the most diverse spheres of society.
It is a task that requires laws, norms and profound normative and social changes so that civil society organizations in general, and women’s organizations in particular, can participate in an equal and safe way in the processes of design and implementation of public policies and spaces for taking decisions. decision regarding production, trade, weather emergencies and disaster risk.
Indeed, women and girls can be, and in many cases already are, these effective and powerful voices driving change to mitigate and adapt to the effects of climate change. Greta Thunberg’s example has raised awareness around the world, but it’s not the only one.
In Latin America and the Caribbean we have many women defenders who fight daily and even give their lives for the rights of women, their communities and their territories. However, the central role they play or could play is not always recognized.
We must address outstanding tasks
As the world begins to see a horizon of hope to begin to control the pandemic, we must begin to face the tasks that the health emergency forced us to postpone and that the war must not make us forget.
Especially since many of the injustices, imbalances and inequalities have deepened during the pandemic. A situation that, in the words of the Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, took us back ten years in rights already conquered.
On the one hand, we are years behind in gender equality and women’s human rights as part of the impact of Covid-19; on the other hand, the certainty that meteorological phenomena will be increasingly intense and frequent due to climate change.
But we also have the hope represented by the millions of women and girls willing to commit, to work, to lead the work needed to reverse these setbacks, care for the environment, fight climate change, move towards equality and peacebuilding. .
Therefore, governments in Latin America and the Caribbean must activate mechanisms to welcome women, continue to build comprehensive systems of care, and integrate women’s organizations and a gender approach in the design and implementation of their response policies and strategies. adaptation and mitigation of climate change, as well as disaster reduction.
