Nexus between the gendered socio-economic impacts of COVID-19 and climate change: implications for pandemic recovery

Abstract

Gender is a critical factor in how people respond to, and recover from major disruptions such as natural disasters or disease outbreaks. Climate-related disasters are known to pose-gender specific problems that disproportionately affect more women than men. Similarly, the COVID-19 pandemic’s impacts along gender lines are enormous, with women being the worst-affected. Existing studies have drawn connections between COVID-19 and climate change, with most arguing that responses to the pandemic provide an opportunity to tackle climate change through emission reduction strategies as part of recovery efforts. We introduce a new dimension to this connection by demonstrating that though different phenomena, COVID-19 and climate change are not so dissimilar in terms of their gendered socioeconomic impacts. Through a systematic review of the available literature, we establish a nexus between these impacts, and examine how the gender responses to COVID-19 can be leveraged to address gender-related climate impacts. We find that social protection, labor market, economic, and violence against women measures adopted in response to the pandemic provide a good opportunity to address the gender impacts of climate change as well. However, current COVID-19 gender responses do not incorporate the interconnections between the gender impacts of the pandemic and climate change. Adopting a nexus approach could help to leverage COVID-19 responses to address the gendered socioeconomic impacts of both crises.

Do Digital Technologies Influence the Relationship between the COVID-19 Crisis and SMEs’ Resilience in Developing Countries?

“…The pandemic has had a disproportionate impact on women's socio-economic outcomes [72]. Managers need to explore opportunities to use technology to manage this impact on women's careers and allow them to be more integrated into business opera-tions.…”

Women, Business and the Law

“…Climate change, forced displacement, and violent conflict are increasingly urgent development challenges for the global population. Evidence from current and past crises shows that women are affected disproportionately (Akrofi, Mahama, and Nevo 2021).…”

Understanding Needs and Potentials for Gender-Balanced Empowerment and Leadership in Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation in Africa

“…It is worth mentioning that 'COVID-19 and the associated terms/keywords were not included in any cluster, meaning that the number of works in this domain with a connection to the COVID-19 pandemic is still significantly low, even though there are works on climate change-gender without connection to leadership/empowerment, e.g., [105][106][107].…”

“…However, some works claim that the recovery plans could be seen as a strategic opportunity to use the lessons learned and additionally stimulate the climate agenda and its objectives [131,132]. The gender-related measures taken in response to COVID-19 could also be applied to address the gender-related impacts of climate change [105,129]. The respondents did not come to an agreement on whether the pandemic's impacts on advancing gender-equal representation in climate-related leadership positions and women's empowerment in climate action were positive or negative.…”