Conserving ecosystem integrity and investing in ecosystem restoration is a critical priority for the world this decade; not only because the health of soils, forests, freshwater, coasts and oceans underpins our economies, but because it also builds the resilience of people and diverse species to climate change.

The Global Biodiversity Framework reflects these intersections in its 2030 targets [1]. They include minimising the impacts of climate change on biodiversity, building ecosystem resilience and enhancing nature’s contributions to people. A majority of countries’ Nationally Determined Contributions incorporate ecosystem-based adaptation (EbA) as part of broader resilience-building [2]. Achieving these targets requires deep shifts in production systems and practices. Greater gender equality–already a ‘must’ for human rights reasons–will accelerate these shifts. Women’s contributions as public and private sector leaders, entrepreneurs and workers make a material difference to the effectiveness and sustainability of climate action. The evidence has been building over years [3]. New evidence strengthens the case further.

In land use, agriculture, forestry and blue economies, women often have unique perspectives and contributions to sustainability pathways. In rural areas of the Philippines, women’s vital roles only became visible and acknowledged when women started leaving the countryside for domestic work in the cities. Women’s previously invisible work of weeding, clearing and transplanting had obviated the need for heavy chemicals, supporting the health and productivity of soils and farm systems. Now, the Philippines Partnership for Sustainable Agriculture seeks to involve women equally in leadership of cooperatives that are progressing climate-smart agriculture [4].

When women’s knowledge, perspectives and abilities are adequately recognised and women are offered leadership roles, this can be decisive in shaping EbA that is effective and equitable. A newly launched report on Women’s economic empowerment in just transitions provides evidence from 15 more countries [5]. I note that gender is a spectrum of diverse characteristics and identities.This article focuses where there is more data and analysis, on equality between women and men; only about 1% of climate literature looks at LGBTQI+ people [6]. Involvement of diverse women is further needed across income groups, ethnicities and ages to foster social inclusion in any context.

How, then, to achieve gender justice, in practice?

Increasing women’s access to and control of natural resources and productive assets, including finance, is a fundamental requirement. Women have less ownership, access to and control of resources than men. Getting resources into the hands of individual women, women’s groups and women-led enterprises for EbA purposes is a top priority. Momentum is building to address these divides, although there is much work ahead.

Unequal land tenure between men and women is increasingly monitored, as by the Gender and Land Database [7]. It is materially tackled through campaigning alliances, such as the UNCCD-led #HerLand campaign. Prindex tracks people’s perceptions of tenure security to inform action, because there is a gap between equality laws on paper and their implementation [8].

The gendered nature of climate finance flows has been notoriously difficult to track. The UNFCCC’s Standing Committee on Finance has decried the “limited implementing capacities and availability of gender-disaggregated data on outcomes and impacts” [9; page 9]. Understanding was recently boosted by a Catalytic Finance Facility study [10], which investigated how much impact investment in the Global South is gender-focused or significantly gender-responsive, including that disbursed by development finance institutions. The authors found that 78% of climate transactions are ‘not even gender aware’; 17% are ‘aware and counting’. Only 5% are ‘intentionally gender focused’.

Another towering need is to address discriminatory norms. Critically, social norms that sanction violence and discrimination against women are highly germane to and should be tackled as part of climate action, including EbA. EbA efforts take place in a context where climate shocks and stresses continue to deepen gender development gaps [11]. When climate impacts occur, society’s spontaneous responses are often discriminatory. For example, there is evidence that extreme weather events such as drought and flooding cause economic hardships, which then drive greater incidences of child marriage, children’s dropping out of school, intimate partner violence and women’s entry into unsafe working environments including sex work [11].

Urgent, wide-reaching and locally-led initiatives are needed to address such cascading harms. The best way to do this is by sensitising, educating and campaigning for protection of women’s and girls’ rights among the range of institutions tasked with EbA and in the wider community. Effective tools include using deliberative dialogues to explore women’s and girls’ empowerment in climate context with school, religious and customary authorities and community institutions–depending on the context [3]. Indeed, many unsung initiatives are already underway in diverse localities, under the leadership of community gender champions [11]. Norms take time to shift and there will always be a need for dedicated funding for women’s groups and gender champions to progress gender equality norms, both in terms of hardwiring them into EbA project vehicles and institutions, and undertaking this work more widely in society.

Gender equality ambitions must be placed at the centre of EbA policies and programmes. IUCN is emphatic that social benefits should form part of nature-based solutions, including EbA, and that such approaches should not be used as greenwash to dispossess local, marginalised groups from land and natural resources [12]. Globally, several organisations are tracking the robustness of gender equality and social inclusion in Nationally Determined Contributions, such as the Gender Climate Tracker. A few governments stand ahead of the crowd on integrating climate ambition and gender equality in these plans: Nepal, Antigua and Barbuda and the Marshall Islands [13].

Gender equality ambition needs to go further than integration in climate policies, though. It must perfuse the range of ‘non-climate’ policies that are relevant to EbA. Governments must ‘mind the gender gap’ in relevant land, forestry, water, nature conservation and coastal-marine policies, as well as employment and labour laws. These instruments are often fundamental to women’s ability to co-lead and benefit equitably from EbA.

A recent Cameroonian study observed that women farmers could be economically empowered and contribute significantly to EbA and emissions reduction if they were able to co-lead land restoration efforts. However, Foundjem [14; page 1] points out that “[while] national policies and policy instruments are not gender-discriminatory, there is room to make them more gender-sensitive and transformative, especially with regards to access and control over resources, access to information and knowledge,… participation, status, and power”.

In Kenya, there is transformational potential for women’s economic empowerment in the context of a climate-resilient blue economy and particularly in the emergent, resource-efficient practice of Integrated MultiTrophic Aquaculture (IMTA). However, government strategies do not foster this opportunity. Achieng et al note that “policy and institutional support are crucial for the empowerment of women in the IMTA sector. This includes revising existing policies or enacting new ones to ensure women’s rights and access to land, water bodies, financial services, and markets” [15; page 2].

Creating leadership positions for women is also important but alone may not be enough for women to exercise decisive influence. Strengthening women’s capacities as climate leaders and boosting their access to information are critical enablers of their climate leadership.

For example, Nepal has a legal requirement for 50% male—50% female representation in government including local government and community forest users groups. Yet, project leaders say that women are often shy to speak up as a result of the way they were socialised. Women benefit from training in both the financial and governance aspects of EbA and also training in negotiations, advocacy and influencing skills [5].

Strengthening local governments’ capacity to implement gender-equitable EbA should also be a priority [5]. Indisputably, governments need to focus on gender justice across ministries and across scales in the pursuit of effective EbA and climate action. However, the capacity of local officials to integrate and apply meaningful gender equality measures has been a particular blind spot in EbA initiatives until now.

Local governments vary in the amount of autonomy they have for decision-making, revenue raising and expenditure. Local officials nearly always have day to day discretion in how they apply gender equality laws and regulations. Many decisions related to EbA and who accesses, controls and benefits from natural resources are taken locally, whether de jure or de facto. Local actors’ resistance to or championing of women’s leadership makes a deep and material difference to gender, social and ecological outcomes.

With the right support, local officials can do much, within their existing mandates, to create space for women and diverse people’s leadership–across government and civil society—and help accelerate that shift to climate-smart, ecologically sustainable pathways that is needed.

In summary, gender justice is a lynchpin for sustainable and effective EbA. Achieving it calls for a tapestry of interwoven measures to address exclusion, untap diverse people’s skills and strengths, and provide equitable benefits for people of all genders.