Action Alert | COP26 Fails on Gender Mainstreaming

The concept of “gender mainstreaming” has been a United Nations priority for its programs as well as its member states since the 1995 World Conference on Women in Beijing, and is described as “a strategy for making women’s as well as men’s concerns and experiences an integral dimension of the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of policies and programmes in all political, economic and societal spheres so that women and men benefit equally and inequality is not perpetuated.”

We reviewed the data on gender representation at COP26 covering “breakdown of the gender composition of constituted bodies established under the Convention, the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement, and of the gender and age composition of Party delegations to sessions”, as reported by the United Nations. Here’s what we have learned:

Out of 232 members across 16 committees, 80, or 34%, are women. Though, this tells just part of the story. Drilling down in each committee shows that only 3 of the 16 are at or above parity and 4 out of 16 have 20% or less women.

As for the Party delegations, out of 2,788 delegates, 1,377, or 49%, are women, which has improved by 9% since the last report. However, when it comes to leadership of the delegations, women occupy just 39% of these positions – also an improvement from the last report.

In our estimation – and really, for anyone who is paying attention – there is far more work to do to reach the goal of gender mainstreaming and it must happen quickly. Tell the leadership of COP26 that time is running out!

P.S. Thank you to everyone who has been participating in #GATallyTuesday! Look out for a reminder on social media each Tuesday to share your tallies!

Nominations are always open for GA Stamps of Approval. If you’ve seen an event or list with awesome gender balance, let us know!

Tell COP26 that time is running out!

🤨The gap between vision & reality regarding women’s representation at #COP26 is wide. 34% on committees and 39% leading delegations is not enough when women disproportionately bear the burden of climate change. #GenderAvenger #SHEChangesClimate https://www.genderavenger.com/blog/action-alert-cop26-fails-on-gender-mainstreaming