COP 24

At the twenty-fourth session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 24) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, held from 2 to 15 December 2018 in Katowice, Poland, Parties agreed on a process to review the gender action plan and the Lima work programme on gender, calling for inputs and lessons learned to feed into the preparations for an updated gender action plan to be adopted at COP 25. Parties also adopted the Katowice Workplan containing the modalities for implementing the Paris Agreement.

Other key outcomes of COP 24 from a gender perspective include:

• a call to Parties to conduct their planning processes for their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) in a gender-responsive manner;
• recognition, for the first time, of the need to consider gender equality and women’s empowerment in the workstream on Loss and Damage; and
• a call to promote women’s and girls’ rights and needs in the development and transfer of technology in the workstream on the Technology Framework.

UN Women led, co-organized, and participated in a number of events to raise the visibility of gender equality and women’s empowerment in climate change discourse and actions. This included contributions to substantive discussions and events on how to make women’s and girls’ rights and needs visible in adaptation and mitigation in sectors such as Agro-Diversity, Food Security, Climate-induced Displacement, and in the Technology Needs Assessments.

UN Women supported the launch of a discussion paper entitled “Women on the move in a changing climate” and contributed to Peru’s launch of a declaration on “Gender equality and climate change”. An exhibit booth demonstrated UN Women’s support for women’s leadership in addressing climate impacts. Through financial support, UN Women enabled key experts and grassroots representatives to engage in the negotiations and speak in events.