From the GWA Secretariat

The broad theme of Gender and Water includes various subjects which become ever more important. The first example is the food crisis. The contribution of women farmers to agriculture worldwide and thus to food production is substantial, up to 80% in some regions. The food crisis cannot be tackled without paying attention to gender relations in agriculture: whilst small women farmers grow a substantial part of the food crops, they have access only to a very small portion of land, of water and of other necessary resources.

A second issue is climate change, which has increasingly serious impact on the environment and on the poor. Women always suffer more from droughts and floods, with their daily responsibilities that never pause, not for one day. Now with disasters becoming more frequent and more intense, it is very important to support poor women, men and children in their struggle to adapt to extreme situations.

A third important subject is the position of women water professionals, which lags far behind that of their male colleagues. For poor women, for women farmers, and for the women water engineers themselves, it is crucial that women achieve an equal position in functions where decisions are made. This is necessary on all levels.

Other subjects the GWA works on are of course sanitation and water supply and the MDGs, but also corruption, privatisation, monitoring using gender disaggregated indicators, and agriculture in arid zones. These are too many topics to explain in a small space. Still, one more group of people needs to be mentioned: refugees from and within conflict situations. Scarce water resources result in conflict, but other conflicts also result in water scarcity of which women become victims.

If you, as GWA member are interested to contribute to one of these subjects, we welcome your suggestions. As a large network we will be able to make a dent here and there, making a change in the lives of poor women and men.

Joke Muylwijk

Executive Director

Gender and Water Alliance

Keywords

• Gender
• Water resources management
• Sanitation