Due to unequal gender norms globally, women are impacted first and worst by climate change, and yet, one of the untold stories is how women in all of their diversity are simultaneously essential actors in local and global solutions. Study after study shows that we must involve women at every level, if we are to succeed in areas of just climate solutions, social equality, and bold transformative change.
Our programs are wide-ranging: from reforestation projects to protection of old growth forests; from fossil fuel divestment and resistance to feminist climate policy advocacy locally and at the United Nations; from Indigenous rights to food sovereignty; and more. Our programs have engaged people in over 50 countries, and focus on immediate actions as well as long-term systemic change to the climate crisis and the root causes of environmental degradation and socio-economic inequalities.
In addition to our programming and campaigns, WECAN coordinated the Women Speak Database, which highlights thousands of women’s stories and women-led climate solutions. Through our Women Speak Database, we are shifting narratives, challenging dominant systems of exploitation and oppression of women and the Earth, and uplifting the many successful solutions women are leading around the globe. We collect and share thousands of stories by and about women and feminists leading struggles and solutions for climate justice under a variety of cross-sectional themes. From ocean protection to fossil fuel phaseout to food sovereignty, and so much more, women are leading the way!
The Women’s Earth and Climate Action Network (WECAN) International is a solutions-based, multi-faceted organization established to engage women worldwide in policy advocacy, on-the-ground projects, trainings, and movement building for global climate justice.
Photo credits: Global women leaders strategize together at WECAN’s founding Summit. Photo via Lori Waselchuk.
As the winners of the 2023 Resilient, Inclusive, and Sustainable Environments (RISE) grants challenge are announced, we take a look back at the transformative work of the 2022 cohort.
How have we got here? The profound question we need to ask as a human family. What has led us into a crisis so monstrous it threatens our existence. Who spoke for our species, determined a worldview where ‘success’ looks like eight men owning the same wealth as half the world, where we have passed […]
Sarah Darcie, Policy & Stakeholder Youth Fellow, explains how the Climate Champions are working to elevate the needs of Indigenous Peoples, highlighting their solutions and helping change the narrative of climate finance.
Organized by COP28, UN Women, UNFCCC, Women’s Environment & Development Organization, and the International Union for Conservation of Nature, the conference seeks to address the gender-environment nexus, focusing on how different genders are uniquely affected by climate change and how this understanding can inform more effective and inclusive climate policies.
