Gender and womens participation in REDD+

national decision-making in

Vietnam

Pham Thu Thuy, Mai Hoang Yen, Moira Moeliono,

Esther Mwangi and Maria Brockhaus

Gender and womens participation in REDD+ national decision-making in Vietnam

THINKING beyond the canopy

Why genders matter to REDD+ ? Gender equality rights are human rights (UNREDD 2012) Mainstreaming gender into REDD+ can help improve the efficiency,

efficacy and long-term sustainability of REDD+.

Inequitable distribution of benefits and excluding women - - from meaningful participation in decision making may not yield intended

outcomes under planned REDD+ initiatives or may further impair

efforts at poverty reduction and sustainable resource management

not taking gender into account in policy research undermines potential opportunities for successful policy implementation as it may

distort the understanding of human impacts on resources

management, hinder forestry planning and skew resource allocation

Yet.. Gender issues are not considered in national

REDD+ program policies and strategies

Ensuring gender equity remains a nice slogan Limited clear, detailed requirements and

guidance on gender mainstreaming at national and sub-national levels

Current benefit sharing mechanism and FPIC overlooked and lacks approaches to ensure that womens strategic needs are met.

Current effort only stop at ensuring the certain number of women participants

Inadequate representation of women: 2 women out of 15 members in national REDD+ steering

committees,

shortage of staff trained in ways to integrate gender into forestry/REDD+ activities

Lack of available data on women leadership

THINKING beyond the canopy

Low level of womens participation in decision-making in REDD+

nominal participation: being membership of the group (REDD+ working group, womens union)

passive participation: being informed of decisions, attending meetings and listening

in on decision-making without speaking up

consultative participation: being asked an opinion in specific matters without guarantee

of influencing decisions

activity-specific participation: being asked to (or volunteering to) undertake specific tasks

active participation: expressing opinion, whether or not solicited, or taking initiatives

of other sorts and

interactive (empowering) participation: having voice and influence in the groups decisions; holding positions as office

bearers.

THINKING beyond the canopy

Opportunities and barriers to womens equal access to and full participation in leadership and

decision- making

Opportunities

Current efforts/proposal in including gender dimension in national

REDD+/PES fund

disbursement/monitoring protocol

Donors pressure to tackle gender

Barriers

Lack of political will promote womens leadership

Lack of regular funding for capacity building for womens development and gender mainstreaming

Promotion requirements and recruitment process prefer men and

overlooks womens interest and role Lack of interest to fund gender study

THINKING beyond the canopy

Recommendations

Government

Detailed guidance on how to implement and mainstream gender in current land use planning, forest land allocation and implementation of REDD+ for local authorities, particularly at provincial, district and commune staff

Capacity building and awareness raising for government staff on gender

Ensure process oriented rather tick boxes Allocate regular funding and adjust recruitments

and promotion requirements

CSOs

Promote and improve women leadership at local level and best practice on gender mainstreaming

Monitor implementation of gender related policies Academia:

More research and evidence, data on women leadership and participation