ECO is happy to share this part of our publication with the Women Gender Constituency(WGC) to help amplify their voice. This article reflects the views of the WGC.
We have all been waiting for this G moment, the Global Stocktake. A number crunching exercise. A moment to calculate fairytale emissions reductions and fancy carbon budgets, to fill in tons of tables, fulfill blurry indicators, and draw colorful figures. However, ECO wants to remind Parties not to lose the essential point in this exercise. 50 years of trying and you still don’t spot the G in mitiGation, nor in the Global adaptation Goal, nor in technoloGy nor in loss and damaGe? We are on fire and you refuse to see it.
Don’t you think that we should all cool down and give it one last try? How can we do things differently, so that we all stay alive? Just follow the instructions and listen to the Gender Action Plan. From priority area A to E you will find the right way to the G in the Paris aGreement. Science backs this approach. The latest IPCC report tells us that reducing our inequalities will help us cope with unbearably HOT situations. So, in the GST, let us focus on the crucial aspects that we should take stock of and let bloom. We must prioritize the needs of those at the forefront, and support their vital contribution to protecting ecosystems and ensuring a just, safe, and sustainable home for all.
Because, dear friends, whether we like it or not, we live in a gendered world. From the moment we wake up to the moment we go to bed, all our actions are influenced by structural inequalities and their underlying gender patterns. And they count when it comes to overcoming crises and reaching the Paris Goal. How could we foster a massive energy transition when women and girls in all their diversity are kicked out from technical education and green jobs and are confronted with a glass ceiling in this sector? How is it possible to develop climate resilient agroecology when women farmers, who ensure food security, have neither access to nor control over water and financial resources? How on Earth would we be able to protect forests – the lungs of our earth- if Indigenous women and girls are denied land rights? How are we going to cut down emissions if patriarchy upholds harmful gendered behaviors and binaries – from the jobs we have, the transport we use, the foods we eat and the way we treat our waste – these binaries hold us back from all have equal rights and voice in climate action – and in turn, severely limit the possibility of action that is both inclusive and transformative.
When discussing both the GAP and the GST, ECO wonders if Parties already forgot that they agreed on some essential conclusions during CSW66 in New York a few months ago. The enhanced Lima Work Programme on Gender and its GAP provide a more comprehensive, systematic approach to gender and climate justice. ECO now expects Parties to make progress on the implementation, with substantial means, building on the lessons of the Covid 19 pandemic.
That would certainly help them spot the G in the Global Stocktake.