By UN Rep Ayuska Motha
After a full week of climate negotiations which were going nowhere, it was a welcome pick-me-up to attend the Gender-Just Climate Solutions Award ceremony on December 9th. The Gender Just Climate Solutions Awards are examples of diverse, impactful community projects that showcase clever, far-reaching solutions to climate change. Although only three projects are selected as winners, the brochure, which is released in 3 languages, contains many wonderful examples of real projects making a big difference. This is the 5th year that the Women and Gender Constituency have been sponsoring this inspiring initiative. The projects can often be replicated and scaled-up in other parts of the world (http://womengenderclimate.org/gender-just-climate-solutions/ ).
A €2,000 prize is awarded in each of the following categories: 1) Technical, 2) Non-technical, 3) Transformational. This year’s winner of the Technical Solutions category is an organization called UNIVER-SEL located in Guinea-Bissau with partners in France. In this wonderful project, ancestral know-how from the Guerande salt region of France is helping women producers of salt and rice to preserve the mangroves. The original method of heating brine to produce salt required tons of firewood. By introducing the French solar method, a reduction in water and firewood consumption prevents further destruction of the nearby mangrove areas. Through the use of this method, the women’s workload is lightened since they no longer have to spend hours collecting firewood to produce the salt. Not only have the women been trained in the new solar technique but also sales, microcredit, financial management and the structuring of cooperatives. Based on the success of this project, a similar project will soon be initiated in Senegal (http://www.universsel.org/).
The winner of the Non-Technical Solutions award is a Colombian organization called ENDA COLOMBIA. In this project, female waste pickers collect and recycle materials contributing to decreasing deforestation, saving electricity, and reducing waste otherwise headed for landfills. The collected materials are made into handicrafts for sale. Nine community organizations are involved in a holistic urban concept which includes urban gardening, seed banks, composting, and a community savings and credit initiative for women. The project’s impacts reach so far as to reducing violence against women and contributing longer term to the peace process in Colombia (http://www.endacol.com/ ).
The winner of the Transformational Solutions award is the Cameroon Gender and Environment Watch (CAMGEW) organization which works to educate and train local and ethnic women in environmental education, bee farming, agroforestry, organic farming, livestock breeding and biogas production, and entrepreneurship skills with financial assistance. The initiative also helps young women fight domestic violence through counseling on rights, business opportunities and awareness to counter early marriages (http://www.camgew.com/). For the very first time, the jury had such a hard time selecting a winner for this category that they awarded an additional project a special “mention of honour”. This was bestowed upon the FUNDAECO project in Guatemala where sexual and reproductive health rights are being taught as a basis for conservation action. Health clinics have been established to provide health care in the protected area of Izabal where the communities have very limited access to health care. Additional facets of the project include training in managing and processing non-timber forest products, agroforestry, and a successful scholarship program (https://www.fundaeco.org.gt/fundaeco.org.gt/english/home.html).
In addition to €2000, the 3 award winners are funded to come to Madrid to accept their awards and receive further training while attending the COP25. I always look forward to hearing about the many exceptionally creative, gender-just, community-based solutions to addressing climate change and the many related challenges faced by many communities. They act as shining examples of what can be accomplished in a gender-just, community-based, ecofriendly and empowering way.