Climate change poses a huge threat to the agricultural sector and food security: about 75 percent of the world’s poor men and women live in rural areas and depend on agriculture, forestry, and fisheries for their livelihood.
... See More + Climate change jeopardizes agricultural production and food security at a time when the world is working to achieve the second Sustainable Development Goal, which aims to ‘end hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition, and promote sustainable agriculture.’ At the same time, agriculture and other land-use sectors are one of the largest emitters of greenhouse gases. This gender gap means that when it comes to developing and adopting CSA practices, men and women are not starting at the same point. To succeed, CSA practices depend on institutional and behavioral changes that are not possible to achieve without first analyzing the social and gender issues influencing policies, projects, and other interventions aimed at achieving sustainable CSA. A growing body of evidence demonstrates that more equal gender relations within households and communities lead to better agricultural and development outcomes, including increases in farm productivity and improvements in family nutrition. There is now an international consensus that the design and implementation of climate change response strategies and projects must consider gender-specific differences in the capacity to adapt to and mitigate climate change.
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The Lao People's Democratic Republic, has scored a remarkable achievement. In just over twodecades, from 1995 to 2017, it managed to increase national access to electricity from 16 percent to more than 90percent of the population.
... See More + A sustained effort to make electricity affordable forthose too poor to pay initial connection charges has been key feature of the achievement. Solid preparatory studies and disaggregated data on specific barriers to electrification for female-headed households were critical for targeting and impact evaluation. This note presents the Power to the Poor Program piloted by the Rural Electrification Project (Phase 1 and 2) inLao PDR. The program provided poor households with interest-free loans that enabled them to obtain a connection to the grid and wire their dwellings. Households headed by women were a focus of the program.
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This note is intended to serve as a quick reference guide for applying a gender lens to the design and implementation of a mini‐grid to enhance development outcomes.
... See More + As mini‐grids are increasingly seen as a potential solution to energy access issues, importance must be placed on ensuring that the benefits and opportunities of the intervention are realized for both men and women. The guidance below provides energy access, social development and gender specialists, with additional ideas and best‐practice approaches to integrate at all stages of the project cycle in order to enhance gender equality.
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In Papua New Guinea, gender-based violence (GBV) is widespread, with 94 percent of employers saying their staff has likely experi¬enced GBV. This violence affects women at home and at work.
... See More + The impacts on the workplace are many and varied: The threat of violence at work increases liabilities, creates occupational safety and health risks, and reduces productivity by affecting victims’ perfor-mance. It also contributes to turnover and hinders career progression. For the private sector, these expenses add up, with direct costs of GBV adding 3 percent to 9 percent to total payroll expenses and indirect costs adding another 45 percent. To address this and other gender-related challenges, a group of companies from Papua New Guinea came together under the umbrella of the IFC-sponsored Business Coalition for Women (BCFW). By developing and implementing GBV policies and working jointly to change public perceptions, coalition members have been successful in supporting their employees and reducing the costs of GBV.
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Even as women make increasing strides in employment, many industries remain tacitly off limits. One hundred economies maintain gender-based job restrictions by law, reinforcing the informal social mores that make it difficult for women to enter traditionally male-dominated sectors, such as extractive industries, construction or heavy manufacturing.
... See More + In addition to limiting opportunities for women, these constraints prevent companies from maximizing the potential of their workforce. In India, IFC encouraged its client, Meghmani Organics Limited, to hire female employees at its newly built Meghmani FineChem Limited (MFL) plant in the port city of Dahej, Gujarat. The company didn’t have female employees at any of its existing four chemical plants. This involved overcoming social conventions and legal restrictions. After doing so, Meghmani was able to substantially broaden its labor pool and to break new ground for gender equality in a sector that was traditionally closed to women.
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From developing talent to reaching new markets, a growing body of evidence captures ways companies can benefit from investing in women as leaders, employees, entrepreneurs, customers and community partners.
... See More + While different companies and sectors will take different approaches to the business case for gender-smart solutions, potential benefits fit into three overlapping categories: improved human capital, enhanced market demand, and an enabling operating environment. This is the first in a series of briefings demonstrating how companies that work with the International Finance Corporation (IFC) have put the business case into action.
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More than 1.1 billion people globally lack access to electricity, and 2.9 billion lack access to clean cooking fuels. Why does gender matter in access to energy services?
... See More + One focus of the gender, energy, and poverty narrative has been that since women play a significant role in energy systems as part of their subsistence and productive tasks, they are disproportionately affected by energy shortages. In recent years however, there is a growing awareness that energy, as a critical enabler to development, can also play a transformative role in the lives of men and women by enhancing their productivity and effectiveness at home and at work. Men and women differ in the purposes for which they need and use energy and in their levels of access. This paper explores the linkages between gender, energy, and poverty and the empirical evidence on these linkages - with an emphasis on electricity and cooking energy. It also reviews global experience on what strategies and approaches have been employed to integrate a gender perspective in energy, what results have been achieved, and good practices and lessons learned.
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In Turkey, only 16 percent of small and medium enterprises are majority-owned by women.1 If women participated fully in the labor force, the Turkish Gross National Income could increase by 22 percent.
... See More + To address the gap between men and women in its supply chain, Boyner Group, which is Turkey’s largest retail corporation, partnered with IFC to launch the Supply Chain Women Entrepreneurs’ Empowerment Program in 2014. The program, commonly known as ‘Good for Business Program,’ aimed to train the company’s women-owned suppliers, enhancing their ability to obtain financing and improve business performance.
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There are few places in the world with greater need, and opportunity, to promote gender-smart solutions for business than Papua New Guinea. Women participate in the formal sector at less than half the rate of me
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This paper examines the economic and social implications of the current system of residential electricity subsidies in Pakistan, and assesses the potential to improve the system's outcomes through alternative targeting and program design.
... See More + The analysis is multi-disciplinary in nature, drawing on national household survey data, electric company data on household electricity consumption, a welfare database, and a specially commissioned qualitative assessment of household and service provider attitudes and experiences. Affordability is only one of many concerns among electricity users, with reliability of supply and customer service being arguably more important. The analysis finds that targeting could be improved considerably by allocating subsidies according to proxy-means test scores using an existing national proxy-means test database. Providing a flat credit rather than a price subsidy could also alleviate certain governance concerns. The paper concludes with some guidance on how to carry out these reforms based on international experience.
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Policy Research Working Paper WPS7912 DEC 13, 2016
Mainstreaming gender and targeting women in inclusive insurance: perspectives and emerging lessons - a compendium of technical notes and case studies was prepared for the G20 Global Partnership for Financial Inclusion (GPFI) by the IFC Gender Secretariat, Finance and Markets, and the Financial Institutions Group, GIZ’s Sector Initiatives Social Protection and Global Initiative for Access to Insurance on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and Women’s World Banking, in collaboration with the Access to Insurance Initiative and the Self-Employed Women’s Association.
... See More + The compendium addresses the GPFI’s cross cutting focus on women’s economic empowerment through financial inclusion. It also highlights opportunities for the way forward, towards a gender-sensitive approach in inclusive insurance, driven by public and private stakeholders. Women’s enhanced access to inclusive insurance as a risk protection mechanism matters for policymakers. This publication highlights various government stakeholder interests and perspectives on furthering this agenda, from that of insurance regulators and supervisors, social protection policy makers and development cooperation agencies. Among others, it highlights the critical role of these stakeholders in enhancing gender-differentiated data collection and financial literacy on insurance for women. This compendium identifies the potential entry points for gender-sensitive insurance approaches and proposes ways for implementing those more effectively. It is hoped that all stakeholders draw on these recommendations to further promote women’s access to inclusive insurance towards the wider goals of financial inclusion and sustainable development.
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Chhattisgarh has made mixed progress on gender. While the child sex ratio in the state is higher than in most other states, it is declining. Maternal health is poor, but has seen improvement.
... See More + Adult women have fewer years of schooling than adult men. Although the state’s female labor force participation rate is among the highest in the country, there has been a sharp decline in rural areas after 2005. On a positive note, gender gaps in elementary schools are closing and female labor force participation is increasing in urban areas.
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Women and girls in Rajasthan face persistent barriers to progress. The child sex ratio is amongthe lowest in India, and is declining. Maternal mortality is high, but has seen improvement.
... See More + Andalthough more women work in Rajasthan compared to other states, there has been a sharpdecline in female labor force participation since 2005. There are fewer non-farm job opportunitiesfor women in rural Rajasthan, and very few urban women work. On a positive note, gender gapsin schooling are starting to close for younger girls.
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GFDRR is bolstering both its commitment to and capacity for integrating gender issues into its climate and disaster risk management efforts. GFDRR’s gender strategy is an overarching plan that emerges from and is driven by the Inclusive Community Resilience (ICR) program but is applied across the GFDRR portfolio.
... See More + The plan addresses two critical aspects of gender and Disaster Risk Management (DRM): (i) understanding and addressing the different needs of men and women in DRM investments; and, (ii) promoting women’s empowerment for broader resilience strengthening. In developing this Gender Action Plan, GFDRR also leverages the momentum of the 2015-23 World Bank Group Gender Strategy2 and its extensive evidence base. The new WBG Strategy builds on the evidence base and conceptual framework of the World Development Report 2012: Gender Equality and Development,3 and was consulted with over 1,000 stakeholders in 22 countries. It aims to move the Bank’s development work beyond gender mainstreaming to outcomes and results. It also identifies climate change and disaster risk management as emerging areas that require additional attention and calls for bringing a gender lens to resilience and developing gender-smart solutions to climate change.
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The World Bank’s Africa Region Gender Innovation Lab (GIL) sits squarely at the intersection of policy and operations. Our aim is to enable project teams and policymakers to advocate for better gender integration from a position of evidence.
... See More + In close collaboration with project teams, the GIL designs, launches, and oversees impact evaluations of new interventions to generate knowledge on which policies work (or not) for closing gender gaps in the economic sectors. We also conduct impact evaluation workshops and other capacity building activities, so that others can contribute to and better interpret the knowledge base. Finally, authors leverage the evidence to promote the uptake of effective gender policies throughout Sub-Saharan Africa.
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In sub-Saharan Africa women comprise a large proportion of the agricultural labor force, yet they are consistently found to be less productive than male farmers.
... See More + The gender gap in agricultural productivity-measured by the value of agricultural produce per unit of cultivated land-ranges from 4-25 percent, depending on the country and the crop.1 The World Bank Africa Gender Innovation Lab, UN Women, and the UNDP-UNEP Poverty-Environment Initiative jointly produced a report to quantify the cost of the gender gap and the potential gains from closing that gap in Malawi, Tanzania, and Uganda. This report illustrates why the gender gap matters. Closing the gender gap of 28 percent in Malawi, 16 percent in Tanzania and 13 percent in Uganda could result in gross gains to GDP, along with other positive development outcomes, such as reduced poverty and greater food security. However, it is important to stress that these potential gains do not come without cost. Closing the gender gap will require changing existing or designing new policies, which may require additional resources.
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This mid-term review of the World Bank Africa Gender Innovation Lab (GIL) used relevant gender and development and impact evaluation literature, results of two GIL-administered short surveys, and 30 individual interviews plus a team group interview to examine GIL’s main outputs and assess how well GIL’s processes and activities are structured to facilitate research uptake and influence policy regarding gender issues in Africa.
... See More + Main findings include: (1) the quality of GIL’s evaluation research is very high, and generating rigorous evidence on what works to increase women’s productivity and incomes is a major value-added of GIL’s work. (2) fostering commitment to evidence-based policymaking is done through in-country evaluation workshops and the fellows program. The workshops are rated highly but can be fined tuned, and the fellows program needs better organization and expanded recruitment. (3) there is clear evidence that GIL’s research has been used to modify policies, scale-up (or down) innovations, and influence policies indirectly. A conservative staff calculation based on 29 projects is that for every GIL dollar spent, 46 project dollars are being directly influenced. (4) the ‘leveling the field’ synthesis report combined all the features of good evidence for policymaking, which helps explain its success in research uptake. Further promotion of research uptake awaits a critical mass of results which is not yet available.
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Launched in 2011, the Second Sustainable and Participatory Energy Management Project (PROGEDE II) for Senegal has been hailed for effectively mainstreaming a gender perspective into an energy project.
... See More + Under the project, women have participated more in decision making; developed skills in technical production, entrepreneurship, and organizational management; and benefitted from increased incomes.
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This report summarizes findings from the inception phase of the research project The Impact of War on Somali Men (IWM) undertaken by the Rift Valley Institute (RVI)1 between December 2013 and May 2014.
... See More + In this project, the Rift Valley Institute is working with Somali men and women to investigate the impact of prolonged war and conflict on Somali men and boys. The IWM study aims to contribute to development and stability in the Somali regions through better-informed policy and practice, by deepening knowledge and understanding of the en-during effects of war and violent conflict on Somali males, and the consequences for Somali society. This is the first extensive study of Somali male ex¬periences of the war and its consequences. It builds on an earlier study on Somali women’s experiences of the war, documented in the publication Somalia the untold story – the war through the eyes of Somali women (Judith Gardner and Judy El-Bushra [eds], 2004). According to the women in that study, women’s and girl’s lives will not fully recover until the impact of the war on adult and young men had been addressed. A forum held in Nairobi in 2013 as a preparatory step in the design of the IWM project concluded that the international community’s commonly-held stereotypes of Somali men, as inherently violent, prone to extremism, a threat to Western security interests and to their own society, are based on flim¬sy evidence about men’s engagement in violence and about the impact war has had on their lives. Yet these assumptions are influential in shaping international and national policy and practice. The intention of the IWM project is to make a timely contribution to improved policy and practice by providing a more nuanced and grounded view, of relevance both to Somalia policy, and to policy relating to gender in insecure contexts more broadly.
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This brief focuses on gender in Macedonia, former Yugoslav Republic of. The World Bank Group is committed to including a gender lens in its activities and addressing gender-specific challenges to reduce inequalities between women and men.
... See More + Europe and Central Asia's Gender at a Glance series is a new collection of data summaries that seek to present a more nuanced view of the heterogeneous gender situation in each of the region's 30 countries. The main objective of the briefs is to provide a quick reference guide for interested users and to increase the visibility of gender-relevant data in the region. The briefs offer basic data on gender indicators and key outcomes for each country alongside regional, sub-regional, and income-level comparative benchmarks. Each brief tells a story about the relationship between gender and national outcomes in endowments (education, health, and demographics), access to economic opportunity, and agency.
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