Climate change debate must include women's voices

Deutsche Welle: In 2007, cyclone Sidr battered the western coast of Bangladesh, killing more than 3,000 people – the majority of them women. It was no coincidence, according to Sharmind Neelormi, who's researched climate change vulnerability and impacts in her country.

Not only were women in remote areas, often shut out from public life, the last to hear of the storm warning. Neelormi says many also shunned existing cyclone shelters many of which typically had just one flooded toilet on the ground floor. While the sight of men relieving themselves in the open is not unusual in Bangladesh, cultural mores make it impossible for women to do the same. "It was a basic engineering fault which could have saved the lives of thousands of women," Neelormi said.

The 41-year-old has since lobbied the government to redesign cyclone shelters. But the example underlines what some campaigners call the lack of a "female factor" in the climate change debate. Climate negotiations and adaptation strategies, they say, have responded poorly to the needs of women despite being most at risk.

A 2009 study by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) found that women in developing nations bear the disproportionate burden of climate change since they do most of the agricultural work and are therefore affected by weather patterns impacting on food, energy and water. Describing "a cycle of deprivation," the report said that women in developing nations had less access to income-earning opportunities. They also managed households and cared for families, which limited their mobility and increased "their vulnerability to sudden weather-related natural disasters," it said….

An aerial view of a devastated village in Bangladesh after Cyclone Sidr in 2007, photo by US Navy