10.032016

Gender equality as a pathway for sustainable development: lessons learned in Eastern and Southern Africa

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In order to advance sustainable development in line with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), it is necessary to address cross-cutting issues on gender, environment, and climate change simultaneously. Despite this, a key challenge remains in ensuring that such coordinated and integrated approaches are prioritised and implemented in national, sector, and local budgets. That is the problem discussed in this gender brief by the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), which draws on the experiences of an ongoing partnership between UN Women and the United Nations Development Programme. The brief includes examples of gender, environment, and climate change integration in policy and programming in Mozambique, research in Malawi and Uganda, and programming in Tanzania, as well as in areas concerning the strengthening of institutional capacities and knowledge sharing.

 

The key messages highlighted on the first page of the gender brief emphasise that addressing gender, environment, and climate change as cross-cutting issues can advance sustainable development and empower women, and that this will necessitate the strengthening of institutional and stakeholder capacities. Furthermore, data are needed to demonstrate the added value of integrating gender into climate and natural resource frameworks to convince decision-makers to take action, while proven climate- and gender-smart technologies must be quickly up-scaled.

 

In terms of recommendations, the brief closes by presenting three key pieces of advice:

 

  • The experiences presented in this brief point to the importance of informing policy-makers and practitioners in the design and implementation of cross-sectoral gender-sensitive climate and environment policies and programmes.
  • Concerted action and partnerships leveraging the tools of government, the legislature, civil society, and the private sector are needed to enact the kind of policies that can achieve the SDGs.
  • Partnerships between UN agencies and other multilateral organisations should be strengthened to increase support for the integration of gender, environment, and climate-linked concerns in policies, budgets, and...
10.032016

Gender-focused, community-led development in rural Africa: The Hunger Project’s Epicenter Strategy

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The Hunger Project is a global, non-profit organisation committed to the sustainable end to world hunger. For the last twenty years, they have been supporting the implementation of the African created and led Epicentre Strategy, which has proven to be an effective, affordable, and replicable strategy that has helped mobilise nearly 2000 communities into 123 community hubs known as ‘epicentres’. Around 1.6 million Africans are estimated to have benefited from the strategy, and in 2014 alone, nearly 46,000 people were trained in nutrition, more than 850,000 kilos of food was stored, and 3,665 children enrolled in epicentre-based schools. This brief published by The Hunger Project outlines the Epicentre Strategy, draws on experience to provide lessons learned, and advocate the wider importance of community inclusion and women’s empowerment in sustainable development.

 

The opening section of the brief describes what the Epicentre Strategy consists of, namely four distinct phases: the mobilisation of communities through workshops, and the establishment of networks between communities, and inclusive of local government; the community-led construction of an L-shaped epicentre building, complete with food bank, meeting hall, public latrines, clean water, and a health centre; the commencement of work to address the needs of the community in health and nutrition, education, food security, microfinance, women’s empowerment, advocacy and alliance building, and the environment; and lastly, a two-year transition period where monitoring remains in  place, but the centre is facilitated in becoming self-sufficient and sustainable.

 

A case study is presented in the words of Dina Amartey, who joined The Hunger Project’s women’s empowerment programme and went on to become a trained animator in Ghana. Dina benefitted hugely from the meetings and activities, learning how to be more independent, and developing a vision. The brief goes on to discuss the work of The Hunger Project in empowering communities in: the leveraging of the resources of local government; sustainable food and nutrition security; education and adult literacy; health and disease prevention; water, sanitation, and hygiene; enterprise and youth development; establishing global partnerships; and measuring...