Indigenous Women,

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Indigenous Women, Livelihoods and Climate
Change Presented at APWLD Research Planning
Workshop Empowering Marginalised Women in
Addressing Climate Change
04 October 2009 Bangkok, Thailand
By Govind Kelkar

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Indigenous Women and Climate Change

• IPCC/2007 Those in the weakest economic
  position are often the most vulnerable to climate
  change.They tend to have limited adaptive
  capacities, and are more climate dependant on
  climate sensitive resources such as local water
  and food supplies.
• The IPCC/ 2007 observed widespread increases in
  temperature globally.
• The current crisis of food and energy across the
  globe, some recent studies have highlighted
  negative impacts of climate change on human
  livelihoods.

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Indigenous Women and Climate Change

• The question are who are in the weakest economic
  position and therefore most vulnerable to climate
  change?
• How have their capabilities, assets (material and
  knowledge resources) and production activities
  been affected by climate change and mitigation
  strategies?
• What can the mutual learning and sharing of
  experiences of other women and men from among
  indigenous and non-indigenous peoples?

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Development and Erosion in Indigenous Womens
Position

• Indigenous women have a major role in organic
  agriculture, they make a significant contribution
  to reducing emissions of GHGs and its consequent
  potential to sequestration of carbon dioxide
  (CO2) in the soil
• They have extensive knowledge of nutritional and
  medicinal properties of plants and roots which
  are of central importance in coping with
  shortages during climate disasters
• The introduction of mainstream development
  programmes in indigenous areas has resulted in
  the loss of land, the decimation of womens
  unique knowledge and a decline in their social
  position.

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Policy Concerns and Commitments by Governments in
the Region

• CEDAW 1979 the 1995 Beijing Platform of Action
  and UNDRIP (2007), governments are committed to
• ensure non-discrimination against women
• set up mechanisms for equality of women and men
  in governance of all community activities
• provide adequate resources to ensure womens
  full and equal participation in decision-making
  at all levels on environmental issues.

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Gendered Pattern of Vulnerability

• Differential effects on women and men because of
  increased stress of traditions, resource use
  patterns and gender specific roles and
  responsibilities
• Womens access to land and other productive
  resources have been declining with the growth of
  exclusion and rapidly growing privatization in
  favour of men
• Womens responsibility for food security forces
  them to look for any available means of
  livelihood, making them vulnerable to violence
  and human trafficking
• Little representation or voice in village
  councils, even in matrilineal communities.

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Gendered Pattern of Vulnerability

• Before the advent of state pressure on
  matrilineal societies, gender relations were
  relatively equal. Women enjoyed considerable
  space within the household and the community to
  make decisions about resource use
• Major agency of change in indigenous gender
  relations colonial education the modernization
  project and nationalization of resources.
• There is an element of local male support in
  these changes, for the men seemed to have
  acquired power and representation in the dominant
  societys image of indigenous people.

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Impacts of Climate Change on Indigenous
Livelihoods

• Consequent upon the integration of socio-economic
  and gender systems of indigenous peoples into the
  global economy, there are changes which foster
• Privatization of access to resources, such as,
  land and forests
• Production for sale in the market, as against the
  earlier forms of production for self-consumption
• The growing dominance of men in community
  management, ownership and control of land and
  forests
• Large-scale involvement of women in agricultural
  production, including livestock, fisheries and
  NTFPs.

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Impacts of Climate Change on Indigenous
Livelihoods

• Women agricultural producers, however, have only
  marginal, limited rights to land and the produce
  and to cash obtained from the sale of such
  produce
• Separation of land from labour, in terms of
  labour not giving them claims to land also some
  having claims to land without labouring on it
• The gradual or rapid decline of NTFPs in the
  unregulated commons and the domestication and
  shift of valuable NTFP species into the home
  gardens or privately-owned fields and
• The growing atomization of households and
  individuals, as against the earlier forms of
  social reciprocity, e.g. mutual exchange of
  labour and support for human and economic
  security.

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Gendered Impacts on Livelihoods

• How do such market-driven processes further
  weaken the position of indigenous women and
  thereby lower their adaptive and mitigative
  capacities?
• Womens increased involvement in agriculture,
  forest and livestock has not resulted in
  increasing their usufruct, ownership and/or
  control rights to such livelihood resources and
  their produce
• Atomization of the household, along with the
  increased role of women in agricultural
  production and out migration of men, has only
  made women responsible for all household work
• These increased responsibilities have not led to
  their visibility as farmers and/or the main
  contributors and decision-makers of the
  community, and economy.

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Gendered Impacts on Livelihoods

• Three major constraints in the development of
  indigenous peoples
• Interventions from outside, which have by and
  large been extractive
• Indigenous peoples own fragile production
  structures, further threatened by these
  extractive external relations
• Weakening of institutional mechanisms
• Women are worst affected as they have little or
  no say in community affairs and their contacts
  with the outside world are minimal. And when they
  do come into contact with external factors, these
  usually are exploitative.

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Adaptation and Mitigation

• Mitigation includes efforts that directly
  address the cause of climate change, such as the
  emission of greenhouse gases.
• Adaptation refers to adjustments in practices,
  processes or structures to moderate or change the
  risks of climate change (experienced or expected)
  and, where possible, take advantage of beneficial
  opportunities arising from climate change.
• Both mitigation and adaptation measures can be
  crafted by the international community, states,
  city municipalities or local communities,
  families and individuals.
• Autonomous adaptation when adaptation measures
  are taken without governmental directive, they
  are considered autonomous adaptation, such as,
  changing agricultural inputs, harvesting water,
  altering the timing and location of cropping
  activities, diversifying income.

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Diversified Livelihoods

• Women of the village of Powerguda, Andhra
  Pradesh, India used savings (from SHG managed
  watershed and road projects) to invest in a
  diesel generator to supply electricity for the
  village.
• With an oil expeller given free, instead of
  diesel the generator uses pongamia oil. (a
  technology developed by the Indian Institute of
  Science, Bangalore). Pongamia is grown on both
  private and community lands in the villages.
• Biofuel (Jatropha) cultivation by Naga women.
• Bell metal works in Bastar and weaving of shawls
  in North East India.

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Concerns on Biofuel cultivation

• Many civil society organizations have raised
  valid concerns on the policy or practice of
  allocating land and water needed for agriculture
  to biofuel production. Admittedly, biofuel crops
  are likely to compete with food crops,
  irrespective of the fact that biofuels do not
  require prime croplands.
• Some general agreement that food insecurity often
  arises not because of shortage of food in the
  market, but because of the fact that people
  concerned have inadequate income to pay for food.

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Research Priorities in Building Capacities

• Areas for future research and action about
  adaptation and mitigation strategies In the
  absence of adequate research on the subject,
  policy and actions can be ineffective, or not
  introduced at all. Limited knowledge limits
  innovation and efficacy of public and action.
• Increasing sensitivity on the gender differential
  impact of climate change
• Individualization of capacities for self-esteem,
  social worth, dignity and identity
• Capacity building for alternative livelihoods
  (1) upgradation of traditional knowledge and
  skills, (2) introduction of new knowledge and
  technologies and (3) womens unmediated access
  and control rights of land and other natural
  resources.

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Womens Voice on Priorities for Reducing
Vulnerability to Climate Change

• Some encouraging cases of major interrupters of
  economic vulnerability as stated by women
• Ownership and control rights to land, livestock
  and housing.
• Crop diversification.
• Flood and draught resistant varieties of crops.
• Extension knowledge in sustainable use of manure,
  pesticides and irrigation water.
• Capacity building with new skills, training and
  information.
• Flood protection shelters to store their assets,
  seeds, and fodder and food for animals.

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Womens Voice on Priorities for Reducing
Vulnerability to Climate Change

• Easy access to health care services, doctors,
  pharmacists and veterinarians
• Access to affordable and collateral free credit
  for production, consumption and health care
• Access to markets and knowledge on marketing so
  that they would be able to trade their
  agricultural produce and NTFP with confidence and
  not feel cheated and exploited by outside
  traders
• Equal participation of women in community
  affairs, management of resources, livelihoods and
  financing of adaptation strategies.
• Evidently, indigenous women are quite familiar
  with the implications of gender inequality as the
  major factor leading to increased vulnerability
  to climate change hazards.