The 69th session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW69) provided a significant opportunity for the global feminist movement to assess progress toward gender equality and women’s rights, confront setbacks, and chart a path forward.
CSW remains a key platform for international dialogue on gender justice, but it also highlights the gaps between global commitments and the realities faced by women on the ground.
In this pivotal year, the Global Alliance for Green and Gender Action (GAGGA), the Equality Fund and the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) organised an event to explore the nexus of gender, climate and conflict.
The event showcased recent research by GAGGA (launched at CSW69) and the Equality Fund, both of which center the crucial but often overlooked perspectives of Global South feminist activists, particulary in Brazil, Burkina Faso, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Mozambique, Nigeria, Burkina Faso, and the Philippines.
Drawing on powerful case studies, GAGGA highlights how global feminist activism addresses the gendered impacts of crises through holistic, cross-movement strategies and actionable policy recommendations. Complementing this, the Equality Fund explores what a feminist crisis response looks like—how crises are defined, how feminists mobilise, and how funding can better support their efforts. Together, these insights offer a roadmap for more effective, equitable funding and policy grounded in the lived realities and leadership of Global South feminist movements—key drivers of lasting, systemic change.
The Intersection of gender, conflict, and climate: A global crisis
Environmental stressors like droughts, floods, and desertification deepen inequalities, especially for women and excluded groups. while fueling resource tensions, undermining stability, and, alongside armed violence, accelerating ecosystem degradation and climate change.
In Burkina Faso, where climate change, insecurity, and displacement intersect, over 2 million people have been forced from their homes. Among them is Rabo Foutouna, a mother of four who fled violence and sought to rebuild her life through agriculture. Determined to regain independence, she pursued opportunities to return to farming—because in this fragile context, land means more than survival. As she puts it, ‘This production not only allows us to feed ourselves daily, but also to regain a certain independence, a guarantee of resilience in the face of the challenges we go through.’
Women’s struggles for land and survival are intensified by extractivist economies, land grabs, and corporate exploitation, which often lead to gender-based violence.
Yet, water scarcity and unpredictable weather made farming increasingly difficult. With support from the Women Environmental Programme Burkina and GAGGA, Rabo expanded her skills in composting, seedling production, and eco-charcoal making. These techniques not only helped her adapt but also enabled her to share knowledge with others. Her perseverance made her a role model for displaced women, many of whom were hesitant to seek land or opportunities. By showing it was possible to rebuild, she inspired others to assert their rights and advocate for their needs.
Rabo’s journey reflects both the determination of displaced women and the systemic, intersecting challenges they face in rebuilding livelihoods. Conflict, restrictive gender norms, and climate change create compounded barriers, yet her experience shows that with determination and the right support, women can be powerful drivers of recovery.
It underscores the need to prioritise funding for community-led efforts that integrate Indigenous knowledge, gender justice, and climate adaptation through a conflict-transformative approach. It also highlights the importance of expanding access to funding for women-led, community-based organisations, including those without formal registration or access to traditional financial systems.
As highlighted in GAGGA’s research, land is central to women’s resistance and survival, yet militarisation and patriarchal systems frequently deny them rights and decision-making power. Women’s struggles for land and survival are intensified by extractivist economies, land grabs, and corporate exploitation, which often lead to gender-based violence.
This pattern is mirrored in the Philippines, especially in Mindanao, where militarisation and resource extraction threaten Indigenous territories. Lumad women face harassment, sexual violence, and even murder for defending their land. One young woman, anonymised for her safety, became an activist after growing up alongside her community’s resistance to land grabs. Through Lumad and Bakwit schools, she found her voice and now leads national discussions on Indigenous struggles. Her story is one of many Women Environmental Human Rights Defenders (WEHRDs) operating in violent, militarised contexts with shrinking civic space. It underscores the urgent need for donors to unite in protecting civic space—especially for WEHRDs from Indigenous, Black, Afro-descendant, and LGBTQIA+ communities.
Resourcing to meet the potential of feminist movements
Across the globe, feminist leaders are defending land, challenging patriarchal systems, and bringing Indigenous and gendered knowledge to the forefront of climate action. They are reshaping global discussions with care-centred, community-driven solutions.
Grassroots feminist efforts face major obstacles. Gender equality budgets are shrinking, feminist foreign policies are being rolled back, and funding for women-led initiatives is declining. Only 2.3% of climate finance targets gender equality, less than 0.1% of global philanthropic funding goes to gender and the environment, and just 0.22% of climate and gender-related ODA reaches women’s rights organisations. Despite their vital role in climate justice and peacebuilding, women’s efforts remain underfunded and undervalued.
At our CSW event, feminist critiques of the global economic system revealed a core issue: bilateral donors and philanthropy often shift responsibility instead of acting collectively. As one panellist noted, governments and private funders must stop passing the buck and work together to support women’s rights organisations—leaders in addressing the gender, conflict, and climate nexus. The urgency to connect the dots and explore financing beyond traditional development aid has never been greater.
If we fail gender equality, we fail climate justice and conflict resolution
The siloed nature of donor organisations often undermines efforts to address the interconnected realities of gender, climate, and conflict. Disconnected departments and risk-averse funding models fail to meet the urgent needs of grassroots groups facing overlapping crises. Donors must break down internal silos and adopt holistic, cross-sectoral approaches that reflect the lived experiences of frontline communities.
This is about power—who holds it, who’s excluded, and how those at the margins are reclaiming it to build a more just, peaceful, and sustainable world.
Stories like Rabo’s in Burkina Faso and Lumad women in the Philippines show it’s time to redefine how funders understand ‘risk’. Rather than focusing on institutional risk, donors must recognise the personal risks Women Environmental Human Rights Defenders take—and fund them based on potential and opportunity, enabling greater flexibility and adaptability in rapidly changing contexts.
As funding shrinks and civic space narrows, feminist movements urgently need support to thrive in a hostile global landscape. Without adequate financing and political will, progress toward gender equality—and with it, climate justice and conflict resolution—remains stalled.
Governments and philanthropy must step up, expand flexible funding, and move beyond traditional streams. Accountability, global partnerships, and shared commitment are essential to meet today’s crises.
This is about power—who holds it, who’s excluded, and how those at the margins are reclaiming it to build a more just, peaceful, and sustainable world. The scale of support must match the scale of the challenges, ensuring those most affected lead decision-making and action.
Grounded in grassroots voices from Brazil, Burkina Faso, the DRC, Mozambique, Nigeria, and the Philippines, the accompanying policy recommendations urge all donors to urgently reform funding structures to support transformative, locally led solutions. These reccomendations are summarised below. You can find the full brief here.
1. Strengthen locally-led, conflict-sensitive solutions for gender and climate justice
- Expand access to funding for women-led community-based organisations (CBOs), including those without formal registration or access to traditional financial structures, and remove bureaucratic barriers like rigid reporting requirements.
- Direct a greater share of funding to women-led CBOs, particularly those focused on the rights of Indigenous, Black, Afro-descendant, and rural communities.
- Support joint initiatives that link gender justice, climate justice, and peacebuilding by facilitating collaborations led by local actors who have deep, contextual knowledge of the challenges in their regions.
- Prioritise funding for community-driven efforts that integrate Indigenous knowledge, gender justice, and climate adaptation strategies, using a conflict-transformative approach to create sustainable solutions.
- Promote a gender-just transition from extractive industries by supporting women’s leadership in sustainable livelihoods and community-led renewable energy projects, while also addressing tensions caused by extractive industries.
2. Protect human rights and ensure accountability
- Enhance crisis response mechanisms by creating crisis-modifier provisions and expanding emergency response funds for Women Environmental Human Rights Defenders (WEHRDs), particularly those at risk of criminalization and displacement.
- Stand united as a donor community to protect civic spaces for WEHRDs, especially from Indigenous, Black, Afro-descendant, and LBTIA+ communities, and ensure all interventions adhere to a ‘Do No Harm’ approach.
- Divest from extractive industries and implement mandatory due diligence during environmental licensing processes to prevent land grabs, forced displacement, gendered violence, and ecological destruction.
- Reform visa and funding structures to protect climate refugees and WEHRDs, avoiding securitized migration policies.
3. Transform governance and policy for conflict-densitive, gender-just climate action
- Leverage flexible, pooled funding mechanisms to support organisations at the intersection of gender, conflict, and climate.
- Maximise impact by promoting coordinated and strategic allocation of resources, closing funding gaps, and supporting long-term investments in grassroots movements.
- Invest in government capacity building to move from gender-sensitive to gender-responsive policies, particularly in the implementation of National Action Plans (NAPs) and Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) for climate action.
- Support legal and policy reforms that promote conflict-transformative land tenure security and gender-just conflict transformation mechanisms. This includes inclusive dialogue on land and natural resource conflicts that is responsive to power inequalities.
4. Redefine risk and fund with trust
- Shift from risk-averse funding to one that acknowledges the personal risks faced by WEHRDs and funds them from a perspective of potential and opportunity, allowing for greater flexibility and adaptability in response to rapidly changing situations.
Hilary Clauson engages in policy analysis and advocacy with the Equality Fund and helps build partnerships toward shifting resources and power to women’s rights organisations (WROs) and feminist movements globally. Noemi Grütter is the Alliance Coordinator & Advocacy Lead, the Global Alliance for Green and Gender Action.