Spotlight on Gender Equality at COP27

The world is gathered from November 6- 18^th 2022 in Egypt for the 2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference or Conference of the Parties of the UNFCCC, more commonly referred to as COP27.  This is the 27th United Nations Climate Change conference since inception.

Monday, 14^th  during the Gender Day at the conference the Executive Director of UN Women laid out what the UN Climate Conference must deliver to advance gender equality. According to findings by the agency (https://www.unwomen.org/en/digital-library/publications/2022/09/progress-on-the-sustainable-development-goals-the-gender-snapshot-2022), the world is not on track to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 5—in fact it is 300 years off.   The report further points out that raised ambition and accelerated action for our planet absolutely require the full and equal participation and leadership of women and girls, in all their diversity. Without gender equality, there is no climate justice. Gender equality is the crucial missing link in the achievement of all the grand plans, including the 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals, the Agreed Conclusions of the UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW), the Paris Agreement and subsequent COP outcomes, as well as the collective commitments of Generation Equality.

On this note, the UN Women Executive Director laid out the following conditions:

• COP27 to take special measures, including quotas, to increase women’s and girls’ full, equal, and meaningful participation and leadership at all levels of decision-making, and to address inequalities including in their access to and control of productive resources such as finance, technology, and land, especially women from poor and marginalized communities
• COP to therefore support a just transition for women through an alternative development model
• COP’s decisions on global investments, especially for women and girls in developing countries, intentionally and directly amplify and foster women’s skills, resilience and knowledge, ensure that women’s organizations, including young women, are supported and protected, and include specific investment to remove critical barriers for women and put protections in place

 She emphasised that the best counter-measure to the threat multiplier of climate change is the benefit multiplier of gender equality.

(Abridged from the UN Women website.  Full story: https://www.unwomen.org/en/news-stories/op-ed/2022/11/op-ed-three-asks-on-gender-equality-to-cop27 )