Putting Women at the Center of Clean Air Action
By Elizabeth Moses, March 7, 2023
A key objective of the Clean Air Catalyst is to exchange knowledge, build trust and foster opportunities to elevate the voices of those most impacted by air pollution, particularly women and low-income communities. By structuring data collection and air quality management around those most harmed by pollution, this global partnership funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development and led by World Resources Institute and Environmental Defense Fund is seeking to build solutions for clean air that are equitable and sustainable.
There is a growing body of research demonstrating how women and men, in all of their diversity, and from different socioeconomic groups are exposed to different levels of air pollution, and as such they face different health impacts and consequences. This is particularly the case when it comes to women, girls and boys’ exposure to indoor air pollution from the use of cookstoves and other household fuels. Less well-documented is the issue that women in low- and middle-income countries often suffer disproportionately from poor sanitation and waste burning and are more exposed than other demographic groups to toxic chemicals due to their occupations. These disparities in pollution exposure are compounded by poverty, gender inequality and discriminatory cultural norms. Lack of adequate housing, mobility, and employment increase vulnerability to the health effects of pollution.
How Gender Impacts Exposure to Air Pollution
After more than two years of investigating the major sources of air pollution in Indore, India, Jakarta Indonesia and Nairobi, Kenya and working with partners to understand the differentiated impacts air pollution has on men and women, boys and girls, and low-income marginalized communities, we now have a better picture of how different people move around the city and the risks to their health, environment, and livelihoods. For example, in Indore, a new analysis of time-based exposure estimates indicated that women spend more time in Unpaid Domestic Work-related activities as compared to men. This was observed across all socio-economic status (SES) groups, making women more exposed to indoor air pollution. Men, in the age group of 20-65, were found to be spending more time than women in paid employment-related activities. Preliminary analysis in Indore also shows that lower SES women spend less time in commute-related activities as compared to higher SES women – indicating lack of affordability and spending capacity on travel needs among women of different income groups.
Our investigation across all three pilot cities has also highlighted the serious gap in local, city-specific gender-disaggregated data on the impacts of air pollution from specific sources, including variations by age, socio-economic status, and occupation. These identified gaps showcase the need for more research on how best to help decision makers understand and take action to address how exposure to air pollution is shaped by cultural norms, institutional practices and policies, gender roles and responsibilities and time use.
As the pilot teams shift to developing and selecting solutions that get at the root causes of these challenges, this is an important time to deepen our engagement strategy and pivot to how the Catalyst team can help empower women to become clean air catalysts. To achieve this goal, each pilot city now has a staff person or team responsible for implementing our Catalyst gender strategy including reaching out to key stakeholders and ensuring gender is mainstreamed throughout our pilot city activities.
What is “empowering women as clean air catalysts?”
Empowering women as clean air catalysts means enabling and empowering as leaders driving clean air action. To do this, Clean Air Catalyst is taking a gender-aware approach to the way it collects data and selects priority sources to ensure that women’s needs and priorities are considered in program design.
Implementing clean air solutions that empower women require the Catalyst to cultivate relationships and partnerships with a wide variety of stakeholders who can bring their expertise, experience and ideas. To this end, the gender pilot teams have begun to identify potential women champions across key stakeholder groups and are providing them with the opportunity to join Catalyst activities and help shape our solution strategies, including how the program will benefit women and reflect their needs.
For example, in Nairobi, Groots Kenya, a national movement of grassroots women-led community-based groups (CBOs) and Self-Help Groups (SHGs) is supporting the implementation of Catalyst community engagement and co-leads the Community Engagement Committee of the Nairobi Air Quality Working Group (N-AIR), the key coordinating group of the pilot’s effort within the program. Along with N-AIR members, the Nairobi City County Government (NCCG) Gender Department and the National Gender and Equity Commission (NGEC), these groups are helping the Catalyst mainstream gender- focused initiatives across both the science-based and engagement activities as well as cultivating women leaders. Recently Groots Kenya and the NGEC organized a training session at a Catalyst workshop focused on key sources of local pollution. They highlighted key gender equality concepts and definitions and gave an overview of what gender equity mainstreaming means in practice. Panel discussions on gender roles and the gendered impacts of air pollution were also held.
In Jakarta, the gender team is setting the stage for empowerment and coalition building by reaching out to a wide variety of organizations that focus on the needs of specific stakeholders including youth, the urban poor, people with disabilities, the elderly and women, feminist organizations, national offices of international organizations, and government offices that support women and children. As many of these groups do not work directly on air pollution, the Catalyst is working to introduce the Catalyst initiative and identify opportunities for collaboration, including coordination with the local government’s Air Quality Forum set up by the Jakarta Environment Office. The pilot team plans to to involve these stakeholders in our gender data collection and analysis efforts, including using interviews and focus group discussions to deepen the understanding around how air quality-related disparities manifest, what it means for their communities, how these impacts are linked with gendered disparities, and the specific activities and policies we can incorporate into our air pollution solutions to address these community challenges.
Future Training and Events
In the coming year, pilot teams will continue to host Catalyst awareness-raising stakeholder trainings and workshops that highlight the gender differentiated impacts of air pollution and why a source focus can open up new opportunities to reduce emissions (source awareness) and empower women. The Catalyst is also launching a series of trainings and other learning opportunities that will expand stakeholder skills for advocacy; and seeking effective engagement opportunities with policy and business officials and other key decision makers to build the capacity of women clean air catalysts to lead coordinated action.
Looking forward to the final two years of the project, we plan on hosting policy and sector-specific forums relevant to the identified priority pollution sources where women and community-based leaders can actively participate and advocate for implementation of solutions and empowerment opportunities that focus on gender-responsive air quality management practices.
About Clean Air Catalyst
Clean Air Catalyst (Catalyst) is a global partnership supported by theU.S. Agency for International Development and led byWorld Resources Institute andEnvironmental Defense Fund, Inc. Launched in 2020, it is focused on building capacity for locally tailored solutions that curb air pollution, tackle climate change, and improve human health. Other Catalyst partner organizations are Columbia Climate School Clean Air Toolbox for Cities, Climate and Clean Air Coalition, Internews, MAP-AQ, Open AQ and Vital Strategies. The Catalyst has projects on the ground in Indore, India; Jakarta, Indonesia; and Nairobi, Kenya.