| Context |
Increased occurrence of climate-induced disasters in urban informal settlements is alarming. Coupled with existing systematic challenges, pose severe hardship for women and young girls.
A good evidence is the recent floods in Mathare Slums that devastated sanitation facilities, water and electricity networks, drainage systems, and schools. This widespread damage results to serious risks to health, education, and increases vulnerability to illness, heightening the demand for care— a burden that falls disproportionately on women and young girls.
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Locally led climate solutions, like solid waste recycling, have shown promise in addressing climate change by harnessing the strengths, knowledge, and resources of local communities to create sustainable, context-specific responses. However, promoting these solutions, such as encouraging waste sorting at household level without considering the social organization of care may have unintended negative impacts on gender equality. For example, in informal settlements like Mathare, where solid waste management and dumping are significant issues, women are often left to manage their surroundings (cleaning) amidst a failing government waste collection system- increasing care burden.
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Young girls and women working in the informal economic sector, many of whom reside in urban informal settlements such as Mathare Slums, are often excluded from the policy-making process. As a result, they lack opportunities to voice their concerns and advocate for equitable economic participation in the transition to a decarbonized economy.
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| Strategies |
Storytelling and Advocacy Projects
- Digital and Traditional Media Engagement: Document and share compelling stories that highlight the intersection of climate disasters and caregiving. Disseminate these stories through our online radio, podcasts, digital platforms, and traditional media channels to amplify their impact.
- Community Storytelling: Capture narratives from communities that demonstrate successful integration of gender-equitable caregiving with sustainable environmental practices.
Male Champions Forums
- Facilitate forums that engage men as advocates for redistributing caregiving responsibilities, fostering shared care practices, and challenging entrenched gender norms.
Girls’ Sexual and Reproductive Health Rights (SRHR) Outreach
- Conduct targeted outreach programs to educate and empower girls on SRHR, emphasizing their role in fostering health resilience within communities.
Awareness Campaigns
- Develop localized campaigns to highlight the economic and social value of caregiving, particularly its connection to environmental sustainability.
- Launch multimedia initiatives challenging traditional gender roles, advocating for shared caregiving responsibilities, and promoting "planet-care" practices such as resource conservation and resilience building.
- Utilize the 7Rs Framework (Recognize) to redefine caregiving as encompassing both human and ecological care, creating awareness about the interconnectedness of caregiving and environmental stewardship.
Education and Training Programs
- Design and implement educational programs that focus on sustainable caregiving practices, emphasizing climate adaptation and ecosystem care.
- Integrate care and environmental sustainability topics into school curricula to promote early cultural shifts in perceptions and practices.
- Develop specialized training modules to enhance societal understanding of caregiving, exploring its environmental and economic implications.
Technology for Caregiving Support
- Create digital platforms and mobile applications that connect caregivers with volunteers, resources, and tools for efficient caregiving task-sharing.
Sustainable Urban Design
- Plan urban spaces that support caregiving through features such as accessible daycare centers, community gardens, and safe pedestrian routes, reducing mobility and caregiving burdens.
Community Watchdog Groups
- Establish and empower local groups to oversee the implementation of care and climate initiatives, ensuring accountability and continuous improvement.
Community Dialogues on Care and Sustainability
- Organize participatory dialogues that use the "Care Lens" to explore caregiving practices while integrating ecological considerations like sustainable natural resource management.
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Research and Data Collection
- Gender-Sensitive Waste Management Studies: Investigate the burden of waste management on women and girls in urban informal settlements, particularly in contexts with inadequate government waste collection systems.
- Quantifying Unpaid Care Work: Conduct gender-sensitive research to measure unpaid care work and its connections to climate adaptation demands, particularly during crises.
- Human Rights Impact Assessments: Evaluate the effectiveness of care-related policies and projects using human rights frameworks to assess their impact on climate and caregiving.
- Care-Climate Nexus Research: Undertake studies to quantify caregiving burdens and highlight their implications during climate events, focusing on resilience and recognition.
- Knowledge and Data Hubs: Create centralized platforms to collect, analyze, and disseminate data on the intersection of caregiving and climate resilience.
- Aligning Care with Climate Finance: Develop strategies to align care-focused funding mechanisms with climate finance sources, such as the Green Climate Fund, to ensure sustainability.
Locally Led Climate Solutions by Girls and Young Women
- Intervention Mapping: Identify and document locally driven initiatives by girls and young women addressing waste management challenges.
- Engagement Forums: Organize forums to share best practices, inspire collaboration, and amplify the voices of young women leading climate solutions.
- Funding and Partnerships/Linkages: Provide financial support and establish linkages with relevant organizations to scale impactful locally led waste management solutions.
- Recognition and Awards: Establish awards to celebrate and promote outstanding initiatives led by girls and young women in sustainable waste management.
Youth-Led Humanitarian Response
- Strengthen Early Warning Systems: Enhance the capacity of youth-led Early Warning System teams and integrate caregiving needs into community disaster preparedness plans.
- Community Preparedness: Develop strategies to address caregiving roles in disaster preparedness, ensuring caregivers are equipped to manage crises effectively.
Eco-Friendly Innovations
- Climate-Resilient Tools: Provide rural caregivers with eco-friendly agricultural tools to support climate-adaptive practices while balancing caregiving and livelihood activities.
Incentive Programs
- Certification and Awards for Green Care: Establish certification programs to recognize households and communities that excel in integrating caregiving with environmental sustainability. Launch awards celebrating innovations that balance caregiving and climate resilience, promoting "green care" contributions.
- Funding for Green Care Innovations: Develop financing programs to support innovative solutions that integrate caregiving roles with eco-friendly practices.
Climate Justice Campaigns
- Advocate for the protection of vulnerable groups disproportionately affected by climate change, particularly in caregiving roles, through targeted campaigns.
Green Skills Training
- Implement training programs for care workers on climate resilience, eco-friendly practices, and green skills to enhance their integration into sustainable labor markets.
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Stakeholder Engagement
- Advocacy for Work Conditions: Lobby for improved working conditions for young girls and women in the green sector, ensuring fair treatment and opportunities.
- Intersectional Dialogues: Organize forums that unite diverse groups, including indigenous communities, women’s organizations, and environmental activists, to address shared challenges and co-create solutions.
- Multi-Stakeholder Partnerships: Establish collaborations among governments, private sectors, and NGOs to redistribute caregiving responsibilities and provide financial and logistical support.
- Multi-Stakeholder Workshops: Facilitate workshops that encourage stakeholders to rethink the impacts of climate change on caregiving roles across households, the state, markets, and communities.
Movement Building for Women in the Informal Green Sector
- Care Cooperatives: Support the formation of cooperatives where communities collectively manage caregiving tasks and adopt sustainable practices.
- Representation in Advocacy: Advocate for quotas to ensure young women and caregivers from urban informal settlements have representation in subnational, national, and global climate decision-making processes.
Budget Advocacy and Resource Allocation
- Infrastructure for Care Reduction: Influence budget processes to implement systems like rainwater harvesting, clean cooking technologies, and efficient public transport to reduce caregiving burdens. Establish community care centers that provide shared childcare and eldercare services, easing caregiving demands.
- Funding Mechanisms: Develop microfinance programs to support women-led enterprises focused on care and climate resilience.
Economic and Systemic Reforms
- Systemic Economic Change: Advocate for economic reforms that prioritize equitable well-being and sustainability over profit-driven models.
Gender-Responsive Policy Reforms
- Shared Caregiving Incentives: Promote parental leave policies that encourage shared caregiving between genders.
- Cross-Sectoral Policy Integration: Ensure care and environmental sustainability are integrated into education, health, and employment policies.
- Unified Advocacy Agendas: Build coalitions across feminist, ecological, and economic groups to tackle interconnected issues of care, climate, and equity.
- Policy Alignment and Redesign: Review and align care and climate policies with international standards like CEDAW and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Use the Care Lens framework to ensure environmental care is a core dimension of caregiving policies.
- Universal Social Protection: Advocate for comprehensive policies that guarantee health insurance, accessible care facilities, and other care services as fundamental human rights.
Public-Private Partnerships
- Foster collaborations between governments, businesses, and civil society to co-finance care-responsive climate actions.
Advocacy and Legal Empowerment
- Access to Technology: Advocate for access to climate-resilient tools such as renewable energy systems, agricultural inputs, and community water conservation technologies.
- Legal Literacy Programs: Educate caregivers and marginalized groups about their legal rights in climate and care-related frameworks.
- Legislative Advocacy: Promote the formal recognition of care work in labor laws and climate policies using human rights principles as a guiding framework.
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