Change values, structures, and power relations to ensure gender equality

Over a two-week period (12 – 27 March 2015), Dr. Peter King, USAID Adapt Asia-Pacific’s Adaptation Project Preparation and Finance Team Leader, who is also the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies Regional Centre’s Senior Policy Advisor, raised questions on how to better incorporate and mainstream gender into climate change adaptation project designs and solutions.  The topic “Mainstreaming Gender into Adaptation: Examples and Experiences” drew responses from  government officials – from Barisal City, Bangladesh, the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD), India, and Pacific Island Countries – and from development partners, including the World Resources Institute (WRI), the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI), Asia Centre, the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies, the SPC/GIZ Coping with Climate Change in the Pacific Island Region program, and others.

A consensus emerged among those who responded that mainstreaming gender into adaptation projects is more desirable than developing a standalone gender component. This would necessarily include dedicating a specific budget for gender-related work, as expressed by Marita Manley at SPC/GIZ and Patrick Jasper at NABARD. Interestingly, however, Bernadette Resurreccion and Ha Nguyen from SEI pointed out that this shouldn’t be an “either-or” option – instead, both approaches should be “complementary” in order to fully address the cross-cutting nature of gender issues. They added, that to effectively address gender really means “transforming unequal gender power relations.” Solutions need to be more robust because only emphasizing greater involvement or economic aid for women is not enough. Values and structures need to change. At the same time all contributors were mindful of the different economic, social, and political roles that women and men play in communities – and, accordingly, they would adapt to climate change differently.

Source: http://adaptasiapacific.org/news/change-values-structures-and-power-rel…

USAID Adapt Asia-Pacific Online Sourcebook for Integrating Gender in Climate Change Adaptation Proposals: http://asiapacificadapt.net/gender-sourcebook/