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Resource centre on India's rural distress
 
 

Gender equality may help improve food security
-The Hindu Business Line

UN study says climate change hits the poor hardest

New Delhi: Do women hold the key to dealing with one of the most scorching impacts of climate change — food insecurity.

According to a UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs study, titled ‘Climate Change Resilience: An Opportunity for Reducing Inequalities’, eliminating gender inequalities could increase agricultural output by as much as 4 per cent, reducing the number of people facing starvation by 150 million.

Access to credit

While a large number of women work in agriculture, instances of them holding land and other assets are lower, which impedes their access to credit and technology, it notes.

The study cites an example from Africa where “women account for over 40 per cent of the agricultural workforce, (but) they constitute only 5-15 per cent of landholders.”

It notes that the cost of not being prepared for climate change would be paid with lower economic growth, especially by low-income nations. Unfortunately, it has been repeated time and again by several studies that the poorest nations and the most vulnerable communities will be the worst hit by the impactof climate change.

Poor hit hard

Interestingly, the study also provides data on the extent of disparity between high-income and low-income countries. In two decades, between 1995 and 2015, economic losses for high-income nations from weather-related disasters stood at $1,135 billion, which comprised 0.2 per cent of the GDP. The figures for low-income countries stood at just $40 billion, which made for a shocking 5 per cent of the GDP, lower than many countries’ actual growth.

The percentage of GDP loss from climate change is inversely proportional to the income level of the country – upper-middle income countries lost 1.1 per cent of the GDP, while middle income ones lost 1.3 per cent. Even within these countries, the poorest face the biggest dangers.

“There is evidence in Myanmar that economic and administrative restrictions led to the concentration of large number of people living in poverty in the Irawaddy Delta, when the area was hit by Cyclone Nargis in 2008. People living in poverty in Bangladesh are concentrated along riverbanks, which are subject to frequent flooding.

“In many countries, including countries in South and East Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean, many people have no other option than to erect their dwellings on the precarious slopes of hills, thereby exposing themselves to mudslides, which are becoming more frequent owing to increased climate variability and extremes,” the study notes.

Even as India has ratified the Paris agreement on climate change – a deal that will push the world into accelerated work on curbing global warming under 2 degrees Celsius — climate change is here to stay.

Policy initiatives

Some of the policy initiatives suggested by the study are involvement of local communities in policy-making; helping farmers change to climate-resilient crops; increasing public investments in and improving access to health, education, clean water and sanitation; introducing cash-transfer schemes etc.