A Series of Think Pieces on Gender Equity and Sustainable Development

Setting Up the Solar Array, Kenya 2009. Picture by otherpaths under CC BY-SA 2.0 License. Original: Flickr.

On the eve of Rio+20, the Heinrich Böll Stiftung North America has asked several of its partners from civil society to reflect in short commentaries about some of the linkages and synergies between gender equity and key issue areas of sustainable development.  This series of 11 think pieces covers topics such as access to resources such as energy, land or water, the care economy as well as women as consumers and gender implication of climate change responses.

• Democratizing Financing for Sustainable Development: Gender Equality is the Key
  By Liane Schalatek, Heinrich Böll Stiftung North America
  Providing adequate financing resources for gender equality through more democratic, participatory and gender-responsive budget processes and financing mechanisms is key for sustainable development.
• Whither Macroeconomics? Sustainable Development from a Feminist Human Rights Perspective
  By Savi Bisnath, Center for Women’s Global Leadership
  Post Rio+20, markets need to be acknowledged in their complexity as gendered, political and historically constituted mechanisms and directed to facilitate the realization of human rights.
• The Feminist Movement and Rio+20
  By Graciela Rodriguez, EQÜIT Institute – Gender, Economy and Global Citizenship
  Women are a crucial part of the social movements which are raising their collective voice to denounce the official agenda of Rio+20 and are formulating alternative proposals in the People's Summit.
• A Caring Approach to Sustainable Development: A Feminist Perspective on Why the Green Economy Concept Falls Short
  By Daniela Gottschlich, Leuphana University Germany
  The green economy concept pays scant or no attention to the interconnected crises in the market economy and the care economy, negatively affecting women all over the world in disproportionate numbers.
• Low Income Women: First Casualties of Green Economy Land Grab
  By Nidhi Tandon, Networked Intelligence for Development
  As the case of biofuel shows, in the pursuit of the green economy, rural women have already faced eviction or exclusion from land grabbed for powerful green agendas that are not their own.
• Investing in Women in Agriculture: Instrumentalization vs. Transformation
  By Alexandra Spieldoch
  While more investment in women in agriculture is needed, we should be cautious about “cutting and pasting” women into a growth model for agriculture that has increased inequality, poverty and hunger.
• Looking Through a Gender Lens: Water in the Green Economy
  By Shiney Varghese, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy
  A focus on women and water could provide inspiration for broader changes. Currently, it is at the intersection of poverty and water that gender issues have become most visible in development discourses.
• From Collecting Fire Wood to Installing Solar Home Systems: Gender Equality and Women’s Access to Energy
  By Gail Karlsson, ENERGIA International Network on Gender and Sustainable Energy
  Energy access is particularly important for women in developing countries, due to their traditional roles and the time spent in collecting firewood, dung, crop wastes or other biomass to burn as fuel.
• Rethinking the Climate Grant: Mobilizing Climate Finance for Women-led Adaptation Work
  By Azita Azargoshasb, Mama Cash
  Women-led climate initiatives often fail to fit comfortably within the existing conceptual approaches to climate action, making it hard for grassroots women’s adaptation work to be sufficiently funded.
• Gender Equity and Climate Change
  By Kulthoum Omari, Heinrich Böll Foundation Southern Africa
  While Southern Africa has made progress in commitments to gender equality, implementation on the ground is weak, with women continuing to face multiple challenges compounded by climate change impacts.
• Mobilizing Women’s “Power of the Purse” to Help Achieve Sustainable Consumption
  By Diane MacEachern, Green Big Purse
  Women control or influence some 65 percent of global consumer spending. With this in mind, strategies are needed to encourage women to direct their spending to support sustainable development.