International gender inequality

Increasing climate risks are threatening the welfare of human society, yet the capacity to deal with the challenges is not gender neutral. The burden on women disproportionately increases, especially for those living in low-income countries. However, the coupling between climate change and gender equality is still not sufficiently addressed.

Xinghao Li of Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, China, and colleagues provide evidence confirming that climate change vulnerability enhances gender inequality based on data across 154 countries from 1995 to 2021. They find that climate change vulnerability threatens women’s reproductive security and widens the gender gap in education and political power. Such effect is less severe in countries with effective governance and low economic risks, but more pronounced in small island developing countries. Mechanism analysis shows that climate change increases vulnerability in the food and habitat sectors, and the impact on gender inequality is nonlinear. Lastly, the authors demonstrate that investments in climate adaptation in general effectively reduce gender inequality exacerbated by climate change vulnerability. Their findings highlight the necessity of incorporating the gendered impact when designing climate policies and projects to increase climate resilience.