Public Agenda (Accra)
Basiru Adam
1 September 2008
Accra — The threat climate change poses to human existence is enormous as participants who attended the United Nations Talks on Climate Change in Accra noted.
Africa is said to be one of the regions most vulnerable to the effects of climate change although it contributes minimally to the problem. The difficult social and economic situation of most Africans, especially women and children, worsens the situation.
Experts have been analyzing the vulnerability of different sectors of economies to the effects of climate change. Women's livelihoods visa-vies the effects of climate change has been studied too.
This is in view of the fact that in Ghana for instance, women constitute about 51% of the population and about 30% of them are heads of households. . "They constitute 52% of the agricultural labour force, contribute 46% to the total GDP and produce 70% of subsistent crops. They play major roles in production and distribution" according to figures from the Ministry of Agriculture.
Incidentally, a lot of Ghanaian women depend on their ecosystem to provide food, energy, water and medicine; and it is this ecosystem that is under threat. "The impacts of climate change will affect a whole host of areas including habitats, wildlife, terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems. There will also be severe adverse changes in soil, arid lands, coastal zones and tropical forests."
"Ghana Climate Change Impacts, Vulnerability and Adaptation Assessments" is the title of a book that made the rounds at the Accra International Conference Centre where the climate change talks took place.
This book, published only now by the Environmental Protection Agency, contains a study by Patience Damptey and Angelina Tutuah Mensah that says that in view of their numbers and contribution to agriculture, women, as in many other cases, stand a greater risk in respect of a climate induced disaster. "Given the variety of women's daily interactions with the environment, they are the most keenly affected by its degradation including climate change."
The study indicates that climate change will systematically affect women due to their reliance on subsistence farming activities. This is also because the climatic changes will affect soil conditions and therefore would have an adverse impact on food production. "Women's income from their livelihoods and other economic activities will become critical thus making them poorer. This reinforces the importance of the environment and particularly climate change in women's lives."
Policy interventions so far have however largely ignored the impact of climate change on women's livelihoods. In furtherance of her obligation under the United Nation Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), Ghana undertook a study to see how climate change could affect her agriculture, coastal and water resource. "Although several subject areas have been developed with respect to this issue, no research has been undertaken with regard to "women's vulnerability to climate change" and a comparative mechanism is not in place."
Similarly, at the Ministry of Agriculture (MOFA), the current policy intervention has been the establishment of the Women in Agricultural Development (WIAD) directorate back in 1989. The objective has been to improve access of women to information on best agricultural practices and facilitating their access to resources. Also, MOFA is said to have developed a gender strategy for agricultural development.
But these interventions have not taken into account the impact of climate change, let alone how it impacts the livelihoods of women. " There is the need to recognize the importance of placing women at the heart of sustainable development. It will be a mistake to solve the climate change impacts without integrating women in the process, or improving their status and economic empowerment since women's management of local natural resources is crucial," the study warned.
If the problem is to be addressed, then the capacities of women who depend on the natural environment, particularly those in rural communities, have to be developed since the study revealed their lack of knowledge on the imminent danger.
The study thus recommends among other things the education of women on the effect of climate change on their socio-economic activities as well as the provision of extension services to women farmers on appropriate technological innovations, improved storage facilities and resource management services.
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2008 Public Agenda. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
