Climate Smart Agriculture Sourcebook: The role of gender in Climate-Smart Agriculture

Abstract

The impacts of climate change affect everyone. However, not everyone is equally vulnerable, and not everyone has the same capacity to adapt to these impacts. It is clear that climate change will be felt by different groups of people in different ways. Due to differences in socially constructed gender roles and social status, women and men experience the impacts of climate change differently.

If climate-smart agriculture interventions are to deliver sustainable benefits and do so in an equitable way, they cannot afford to neglect these differences. Rural women are crucial to agricultural production. In developing countries, on average, women make up 43 percent of the agricultural labour force, ranging from about 20 percent in Latin America to often over 50 percent in Eastern and Southeastern Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. They also comprise 2/3 of the world’s small livestock managers. Between 1980 and 2010, the share of women employed in agriculture increased from about 30 percent to 43 percent in North Africa, and from 35 percent to 48 percent in the Near East (FAO, 2011).

There is now a broad consensus that the constraints associated with gender inequality, which unfairly disadvantage and marginalize women in agricultural communities must be addressed to increase agricultural productivity, improve food and nutrition security, reduce poverty and build the resilience of rural populations. To make agricultural development climate-smart, a gender-responsive approach is needed to gain a nuanced understanding of the root causes of vulnerability and factors that determine adaptive capacity, and allow gender-based inequalities to be addressed effectively. Implementing programmes and strategies that address the differential needs and capacities of women and girls, and men and boys, and improve the social positions of women and vulnerable groups, is critical for making the transition to climate-smart agriculture and meeting the food and nutrition security needs of an expanding population in an equitable and sustainable way.

This module draws on insights from the Gender in Climate-Smart Agriculture module of the Gender in Agriculture Sourcebook (World Bank, FAO, IFAD, 2015) and other resources. It synthetises recent research evidence and experiences with climate-smart agriculture to provide guidance to a wide range of stakeholders on opportunities for future gender-responsive climate-smart agricultural investments and interventions.