Water is sustaining human life and many human activities. Deteriorating water quality, increasing frequency and intensity of floods pose major challenges to societies. Changing seasonal and regional rainfall patterns will influence the availability of water resources.

The impacts of climate change on water resources and the water cycle as well as the availability of water in sufficient quantity and quality will have wide-ranging effects on societies, on public health, economic activities and the environment.

Gender Dimension

Gendered roles and responsibilities play a central role in water provision and management. In developing countries, it is women who are primarily responsible for water for household use, while men are seen as responsible for water use in business related activities like agriculture or livestock farming. Nevertheless, in large parts of the world, women use water for subsistence agriculture and small livestock rearing as well as for productive work and home industries.

Water scarcity as well as heavy rainfalls and more frequent floods lead to increasing additional burdens for women. They have to spend additional time collecting water, cleaning and maintaining their houses after floods and caring for their families. In order to provide water for their households and subsistence agriculture, women often have to walk long distances and carrying heavy weights. For example, in East Africa women sometimes spend up to 27% of their caloric intake on collecting water.

According to the World Health Organization 80 percent of all illnesses in the world are attributable to unsafe water and sanitation. Water-borne diseases kill million people, millions more are sickened with diarrhoea, malaria, hepatitis, and other diseases because of the absence of clean and female-only sanitation facilities in schools. Women’s reproductive functions make their immune systems more susceptible to contamination, which means that their health may be impaired more severely than that of a man.

In many cases, access to water is linked to land rights – in many parts of the world women’s right to own or inherit land is prohibited or restricted. If women do have access to land, the plot is often poor quality soil or does not provide sufficient access to irrigation.

Water is a public good and a basic requirement for life on Earth. Due to climate change clean water will become more scarce. Privatisation may add further pressure to a just water distribution. Low-income households, particularly those headed by women, struggle to pay large lump sums for water connections and even monthly payments. Therefore, women have been central in the struggle against the sale of public water services to transnational companies.

Water scarcity is increasingly becoming a trigger for conflicts. The growing number of conflicts and wars leads to increasing numbers of displaced people and refugees, the majority of which are women and children. The loss of land and water sources causes even more insecurity among refugees, and puts an extra burden on women. Securing access to land and safe water are major challenges for the resettlement of women refugees and their families. Moreover, most violent conflicts aggravate the existing unequal opportunities for access to water.

Although women manage most of households water issues and have important knowledge and experience in saving water they are seldom consulted and their needs are less considered. Like studies of water supply governance shown, the whole gender dimension is excluded in debates on participation schemes and policies. Because of the significant gender differences in use, access and management of water, women’s participation is essential for successful water management and adaptation planning.

Response

Water availability is heavily impacted by climate change. It is evident that women will be much more affected than men by impacts like increasing water scarcity , increasing desertification, more and heavier floods (in their respective gender roles), and water borne diseases (in their physical constitution).
Women’s access to water is particularly endangered in situations of scarcity. When there is competition for water, poor people often lose out to those who can afford more powerful machinery for extracting water or those who have more political and economical influence. This is well reported from developing countries. Nevertheless, implementation of this knowledge in practical action is lacking.

To support the integration of gender knowledge into policy and planning, it is necessary to train and sensitize planners. Toolkits available from women’s or gender networks should be taken as a basis. Gender networking between experts from the North and the South should be strengthened.

Many countries are developing national adaptation plans, and/or adaptation measures and projects. Priority activities are identified that respond to the urgent and immediate needs. Coping with water scarcity, heavy rainfalls, floods are important issues in the adaptation debate. Equal participation of women and men is indispensable for successful planning. Additionally, gender experts should be consulted during the planning process. Gender aspects must be integrated into the whole procedure (research – consultation – planning – implementation – monitoring), supported by appropriate tools.