Energy after Rio - Prospects and Challenges - Executive Summary (UNDP, 1997, 38 p.): 2. Energy and Major Global Issues: 2.1 Energy and Social Issues: 2.1.2 Gender Disparity

Energy after Rio - Prospects and Challenges - Executive Summary (UNDP, 1997, 38 p.)

(introduction...)

Acknowledgments

Foreword

Notes on the Authors and Contributors

Abstract

1. Introduction

2. Energy and Major Global Issues

(introduction...)

2.1 Energy and Social Issues

2.1.1 Poverty

2.1.2 Gender Disparity

2.1.3 Population

2.1.4 Undernutrition and Food

2.2 Energy and Environment

2.2.1 Health

2.2.2 Acidification

2.2.3 Climate Change

2.2.4 Land Degradation

2.3 Energy and the Economy

(introduction...)

2.3.1 Investment Requirements of Energy

2.3.2 Foreign Exchange Impacts of Energy Imports

2.4 Energy and Security

(introduction...)

2.4.1 Energy and National Security

2.4.2 Nuclear Energy and Nuclear Weapons Proliferation

2.5 Energy and Global Issues: The Implications

3. New Opportunities in Energy Demand, Supply and Systems

3.1 Introduction

3.2 Demand Side: Energy and Energy-Intensive Materials Efficiency

3.3 Supply Side: Renewables and Clean Fossil Fuel Technologies

3.4 Fuels and Stoves for Cooking

4. Sustainable Strategies

4.1 Global Energy Scenarios

4.2 Implications for the Developing World

4.3 Implications for Energy Exporting Economies

4.4 Some General Implications of Sustainable Energy Systems

4.4.1 Energy and the Economy

4.4.2 Energy and Poverty

4.4.3 Creating Jobs

4.4.4 Women

4.4.5 Rural Development

4.4.6 Urban Development

4.4.7 Energy and the Environment

4.4.8 Energy and Security

4.5 Conclusions

5. Making It Happen: Energy for Sustainable Development

Glossary of Abbreviations

2.1.2 Gender Disparity

Conventional energy approaches virtually exclude women’s concerns from the current capital-intensive, monetised, expert-dominated energy sector. Consequently, economic growth has unfortunately been accompanied by (often severe) gender disparities. Globally, 70% of people living in poverty are women.

More than half of the world’s households cook daily with wood, crop residues and untreated coal. Home-based industries depend on biomass supplies. Women in developing countries spend long hours working in survival activities - cooking, fuelwood collection, water carrying and food processing. Women’s time in these survival tasks is, however, largely invisible in the statistics compiled on patterns of energy use. Women and children’s time spent on fuel and water collection represents a high social and economic cost to the family and society, and is directly related to the low level of energy services that are available to people living in poverty.

The nutritional status of women is often worsened because, for cultural reasons, they eat last and least and in addition they tend to expend more energy in work than men. Part of this greater labour is related to domestic chores such as gathering firewood, fetching drinking water, etc. These chores could be avoided, for example, by providing access to cooking fuel and/or efficient stoves and to water for domestic purposes.

Women’s key role in environment issues and sustainable development is an accepted fact. What is less well-known is that many of women’s environmental roles and concerns are closely linked to the use, supply and management of energy resources. Strengthening the role of energy in advancing sustainable development will require paying attention to the special role of women, and specific attention to women’s participation in energy activities. This can be achieved by recognising the specific relationships between women’s needs, roles and concerns, and the energy system.