- Gender Equality in Climate Action Accelerator to support governments in promoting gender-sensitive climate sector policies
- Accelerator to help private-sector companies improve the gender responsiveness of their corporate climate governance
- Accelerator to help users meet the goals of the Paris Agreement on climate change
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the African Development Bank Group (AfDB) and the French Development Agency (AFD), in partnership with the Egyptian government, have launched the Gender Equality in Climate Action Accelerator.
The Accelerator will help private-sector companies improve the gender responsiveness of corporate climate governance. It will also help governments to promote gender-sensitive climate policies, thereby accelerating their green transition to meet Paris Agreement targets, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Gender Action Plan and key Sustainable Development Goals.
The launch took place on Gender Day, Monday 14 November, on the sidelines of the 27th annual global climate summit (COP27) in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt. It brought together global leaders, heads of development finance institutions and private-sector business representatives.
Egypt has called the global community to action on climate-related gender equality, stating that now is the time to show progress on the ground.
Egypt’s Minister of International Cooperation, Rania Al-Mashat, said: “COP27 strengthens international efforts to move from pledges to implementation and achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement. The launch of the Accelerator, a collaboration between the government and development partners, strengthens gender equality efforts, enhances climate action and adaptation efforts to ensure women’s more effective participation. It also creates opportunities to enhance women’s development and to draw key lessons to accelerate gender equality in work tackling climate change.”
EBRD President Odile Renaud-Basso said: “Women are a transformative force for economies. We need to harness their ingenuity and their potential and their business acumen to identify and deliver the solutions to the huge challenges we face, to tackle climate change. Our role is to work collectively to create better access to green skills and jobs, lend more support for innovative entrepreneurship in the green economy and scale up investments in sustainable business practices.”
Cassilde Brenière, Deputy Chief Operations Officer of AFD, said: “This initiative is in line with AFD’s feminist policy. AFD is proud to showcase that more than 60 percent of its climate finance contributes to achieving gender equality. AFD projects have shown that adaptation strategies are more effective when they involve women. Women are a force for structural transformation and we need women to achieve our climate ambitions.”
Gareth Philips, Manager of Climate and Environment Finance at the AfDB, added: “We at the African Development Bank Group believe that this is a step in the right direction. We need to get better at tracking, and we are committed to working with African governments and development partners to develop and fine-tune tools to improve on gender equality in climate change.”
Egypt is a founding member of the EBRD. Since the start of its operations there in 2012, the EBRD has invested more than €10 billion in 154 projects across the country.