Menu

Gender activities leading up to COP22 in Marakkesh

Gender Just Climate Solutions Award

The Women and Gender Constituency is very pleased to invite you to participate in the Gender Just Climate Solutions Awards initiative for the upcoming UN climate negotiations (COP22) in Marrakesh!

The Women and Gender Constituency of UNFCCC and other women, gender and human rights advocates have been actively pushing world leaders to ensure a just outcome, one which works for people and the planet, and which responds to injustice among and within countries in relation to climate impacts and resilience. We know the solutions to a more sustainable future already exist- and it’s time to showcase them far and wide, and demand change. After the Paris Agreement and as world leaders meet at COP22 this November, we must act to highlight the importance of gender equality, women rights and women’s contribution to climate solutions.

The Gender Just Climate Solutions Award will make gender responsive and equitable solutions visible at COP22 in Marrakesh and central to just climate action all over the world.

We are asking you to describe your women & gender initiative for climate solutions, in one of three categories:

  • Technical climate solutions with a women or gender perspective (e.g. in area of renewables, water-saving adaptation technologies etc.)
  • Non-technical climate solutions with a women or gender perspective (e.g. in area of efficiency, consumption changes etc.)
  • Transformation climate initiatives with a women or gender perspective (e.g. addressing governance, institutional change, planning processes etc.)

The 3 award winners, each per category, receive 1000 Euros as award and will be showcased at the Gender Just Climate Solutions Exhibition at the UNFCCC negotiations in COP22 in Marrakesh, Morocco. Additionally, the winners will benefit from a 1-year-mentoring programme of the Women and Gender Constituency. 10 nominees per category will be published in the Gender Just Climate Solutions Publication.

You can find more details about the award, including full criteria and application form.


SB44 Meeting, June 2016 in Bonn

After the Paris Agreement was adopted at COP21 in Paris, the hard work is just getting started: the operationalisation and implementation of the agreement. With this goal in mind, the Parties to the UNFCCC came together from May 16-26 for the 44th Meeting of the Subsidiary Bodies (SB44) in Bonn, Germany.

Part of the negotiations concerned the continuation of the Lima Work Programme on Gender. Adopted in 2014 with a planned duration of two years, the Work Programme encouraged Parties to advance gender balance, promote gender sensitivity in developing and implementing climate policy and achieve gender-responsive climate policy in all relevant activities under the UNFCCC. In light of the need for further action, many Parties and observers have begun to advocate for the continuation and enhancement of the programme. Initial recommendations in this respect were put forward during a two-day in-session workshop on gender-responsive climate policy with a focus on adaptation and capacity-building during SB44. The agenda und full presentations of the workshop are available here. Take a look also at the official report by the UNFCCC Secretariat.

Furthermore, Christiana Figueres’ successor was announced in Bonn: Patricia Espinosa, former foreign minister of Mexico, will be the next Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC. Given the high number of women candidates, we are happy to see that the UNFCCC seems to be putting the goal of achieving gender balance into practice, at least in regard to this leadership position.