Gender Just Climate Solutions Awards 2024

Deadline: 21-Jul-24

Together with the Women and Gender Constituency (WGC), WECF International is happy to announce that the call for applications for the annual Gender Just Climate Solutions Awards is now open!

In 2015, the WGC launched its first ‘Gender-Just Climate Solutions Awards. These awards aim to showcase real solutions for a more just, equal, and healthy planet. Previously recognized initiatives include women-owned and operated energy cooperatives, advocacy work on women’s land tenure rights, ethnic women-led reforestation based on strengthening the honey value chain, or gender-responsive water technologies.

The Gender Just Climate Solutions Awards are granted every year to grassroots, community groups and non-governmental organizations tackling the climate emergency while advancing gender equality. These solutions are leading community solutions and system-changing climate action that bring multiple social and environmental improvements. They contribute to raising the ambition to achieve the 1.5-degree target by 2030.

Three winners are selected by a diverse group of jury members from the WGC following an open and transparent process and are announced during an official, high-level ceremony at the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP).

Categories

• Winning solutions are showcased across three different project categories:
  • Technical – gender-responsive climate solutions focusing on technologies, i.e. water, RE, food production or transformation, digitalization, waste reduction etc.
  • Non-technical – gender-responsive climate solutions focusing on behavioral change, mutual learning, skills sharing, capacity strengthening etc.
  • Transformational – gender-responsive climate solutions focusing on addressing governance, institutional/societal change etc.

Funding Information

• Each winner receives a €5000 monetary award, a chance to attend COP29, which will be held in Baku, Azerbaijan, fully covered travel, and enter WECF’s long-term mentoring programme which supports them in strengthening and upscaling their leading solutions. Up to 20 nominees’ projects are presented in the Awards publication, on the online platforms, and at the Awards Ceremony during the COP.

Eligibility Criteria

• All types of activist, grassroots and women-led, and gender equality organizations and groups working on issues related to climate change from all over the world are encouraged to apply. Only non-governmental initiatives are eligible (local or national government initiatives cannot be considered). The project/initiative should either have been completed or be in current operation for at least a year. The initiative must fit within one of the 3 award categories of projects.
• They highly encourage grassroots, women-led and LGBTQI+ organizations from the Global South and Global East to apply.

Criteria

• Initiatives will be weighed against the following criteria aimed to measure contributions to gender equality, resilience, and sustainability. Winning projects will ideally work across all key result areas, though the organizers note that not all projects will be in a position/stage to meet each and every criterion. Due to existing inequalities and a lack of available resources globally, priority will be given to women and gender-non-conforming-led initiatives, recognizing that programs do not necessarily need to be women-led to be gender-just.
  • Result Area 1: Women’s rights and gender equality
    • Provides equal access to benefits for women, men, gender non-conforming, and youth
    • Aims to alleviate and/or does not add additional burden to women’s workload (such as via additional natural resource management or care responsibilities without compensation
    • Empowers women through better mobility/accessibility, enhanced livelihood security, enhanced food security, improved health, access to safe water, etc. (as many benefits as possible)
    • Promotes women’s democratic rights and participation by ensuring decision-making by local women, men, women’s groups, cooperatives, and communities.
  • Result Area 2: Climate Resilience
    • Locally led and/or locally driven (decentralized and appropriate)
    • Ensures self-sufficiency & a low input of resources (safe, affordable, and sustainable)
    • Contributes to climate change mitigation, emissions reduction, and/or climate adaptation (the project is sustainable)
  • Result Area 3: Scaling-up and transfer
    • Results can be shared, spread & scaled up (replicable elsewhere, not just benefiting one individual)
    • Shows interlinkages to cross-cutting issues, such as (including, but not restricted to) peace-building, natural resources management, food security and/or health, water, and sanitation.

For more information, visit WECF International.