Environment

Women and the environment is one of the 12 critical areas of concern for achieving gender equality identified by the Beijing Platform for Action in 1995. The Platform for Action recognizes that environmental conditions have a different impact on the lives of women and men due to existing gender inequality. In particular, lack of access to clean water and energy, environmental degradation and natural disasters disproportionately affect women in terms of health, unremunerated work and well-being. Furthermore, the Platform for Action stresses that women’s role in sustainable development is hampered by unequal access to land, financial resources and agricultural information and technologies; unequal access to formal training in professional natural resources management; and limited involvement in policy formulation and decision-making in natural resources and environment management. All these barriers continue to exist 15 years after the Platform for Action was endorsed by governments.

Related Subject(s): Women and Gender Issues