Thank you, Ambassador Skoog
Excellencies, dear colleagues
Our meeting today is timely, just as the priority theme for the 66th Session of the Commission on the Status of Women.
This is the first time that the issue of climate change will be negotiated in the CSW. It represents a great opportunity to address and set a normative framework on gender and climate change.
I am glad that we can come together to share ideas and best practices. The outcome document, including the group’s main commitments that we will adopt is a step in the right direction to ensuring that the agreed conclusions of the CSW include strong language on the linkage between climate change and violence against women.
In Liberia, the Government is in the forefront of mainstreaming gender in climate change. In 2018, we adopted the mainstreaming Gender in Climate Change National and Sectoral Adaptation Plans. The plans promote and integrate gender-responsive planning, monitoring, and evaluation in all programs developed to address climate change.
Like the COVID-19 pandemic, we all agree that climate change has a disproportionate effect on women and girls, with many experiencing greater risks, burdens, and impacts.
Hence, within the context of the priority theme of CSW-66, Liberia is supportive of the draft outcome document of the Group of Friends. In this regard, we would like to see the following in the agreed conclusions:
- The recognition of the linkage between climate change and violence against women, especially the fact that climate change increases the risk of violence against women, and that in most cases existing inequalities and vulnerabilities are what makes some communities more susceptible to impacts of climate change, than others;
- Support for the development of national capacities to enhance the collection of ethical and disaggregated data on the different impacts of climate change on women and girls;
- The enhancement of women's participation and leadership at all levels, especially in institutions that deal with climate change; and
- The enhancement of cooperation and collaboration at the national, regional and international levels to address the impacts of climate change on women and girls.
I thank you for your kind attention
