ACTIVISTS and politicians at the Cop26 climate conference in Glasgow joined calls for a feminist green new deal today, warning that women are being disproportionately affected by the climate emergency. 

Women are considered more vulnerable to the crisis as they form a large majority of the world’s poor and often depend on small-scale farming, while UN statistics have indicated that they form 80 per cent of people displaced by climate change.

In Glasgow, where events throughout the day focused on the relationship between gender and climate change, speakers at the Not Without Us fringe said that the views and wellbeing of women must not be put second in tackling the crisis.

Dunja Krause of the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development said that talk of a just transition to a greener planet, usually thought of in terms of the workforce, must be expanded to those most affected by climate policy and include more women’s voices.

She also warned that issues such as access to healthcare, dangers in the workplace and other risks that disproportionately affect women have been exacerbated during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Dinda Nuur Annisaa Yura of Indonesian group Solidaritas Perempuan likewise said that discussion around a just transition must extend to the many women who remain in precarious and “informal” work, and who do not have the benefit of a union.

She said that the global imbalance of economic and social systems has been responsible for the climate crisis, and that tackling gender injustice is critical in addressing the ecological emergency.

“We also need to address the specific situations of women who are not recognised as workers, or cannot get any basic rights from employers,” she said. 

Gambian climate activist Fatou Jeng explained how her country is being affected by climate change despite contributing “very little” to the release of greenhouse gases.

She said that she had seen girls forced into child marriage due to family poverty caused by climate change, and others forced to stay at home due to flooding.

Violence against women and girls involved in climate activism is also on the rise, according to Swedish MEP Alice Bah Kuhnke. 

Ms Kuhnke, who is a co-ordinator of the European Union’s committee on women’s rights and gender equality, told the Morning Star that violence against female activists is “happening in silence” and has forced women to leave the climate justice movement. 

“For too many years, violence, harassment and hate against girls and women have been seen as bullying and something they have to live with, something that they need to accept. But what is illegal in real life is also illegal online. We need to act.”

Asked about the online abuse faced by notable climate activists Greta Thunberg and Vanessa Nakate, she said: “They are under a lot of pressure and [face a lot of] hate due to that. 

“The security around Greta Thunberg, for example, is huge. Grown-up men are threatening her because she uses her right to raise her voice, so it’s really scary.”

National leaders in Britain also underlined the importance of ensuring that climate change is a feminist issue. 

Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said: “We must make sure that the experiences of women and girls across the world, so often disproportionately impacted by climate change, are understood as we devise the solutions.

“And we must make sure that the voices of women are at the centre of creating and implementing the solutions to climate change.”

The British government meanwhile announced that £165 million would go towards boosting equality for women and climate action.

Its announcement came as an annual report from the Climate Action Tracker initiative warned of a “massive credibility gap” between countries’ promises at the UN talks and the action they are actually taking.

Assessing 140 countries’ long-term net-zero pledges, it found that meeting all of them could curb temperature rises by the end of the century to 1.8°C.

But its analysis found that the world is heading for at least 2.4°C of global warming based on the climate action that countries have pledged to take in the next decade.

Bill Hare, chief executive of Climate Analytics, one of the partners in the analysis, said: “It’s all very well for leaders to claim they have a net-zero target, but if they have no plans as to how to get there, and their 2030 targets are as low as so many of them are, then frankly, these net-zero targets are just lip service to real climate action.

“Glasgow has a serious credibility gap.”