Gender and Climate Change: Giving the ?Latecomer? a Head Start

Gender issues have made a slow entry into the climate change debate. This is partly due to the fact that climate change has generally been perceived as a global phenomenon, with little attention being paid to differentiating the potential impacts that women and men might face. For example, women tend to have less access to valuable resources such as land and credit, which reduces their capacity to adapt to the negative impacts of climate change. This paper focuses on three climate sensitive areas - agriculture, water and energy - and considers how adaptation strategies could be designed to help women and men in these sectors to mitigate the effects of climate change. Suggestions include the need for forest management projects that offer new skills to help improve crop species, soil quality and water conservation. Local community projects could also be a source of funds for women wishing to embark on specific activities such as sustainable harvesting of forestry products..