This section seeks to review how global documents related to REDD+ address gender issues. The purpose of this section, however, is not to provide an exhaustive list of inter- national laws, agreements, international REDD+ safeguards and standards being devel- oped by relevant international donors and funding programs and how they engage with gender equality. Rather, I limit my discussion to the official documents published and endorsed by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) that might implicitly or explicitly address gender issues, and any outputs produced by two international multilateral initiatives, namely the UN-REDD Vietnam Programme (a col- laborative project between UNDP, UNEP and FAO) and the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF, a project funded by the World Bank), both of which were actively in- volved in the Readiness Stage in REDD+ countries.
It is noticeable that gender has been acknowledged by both the literature and global conventions and agreements on climate change, environmental conservation and sustainable development prior to REDD+, and the Cancun Agreements 2010 on Environ- mental and Social Safeguards (including gender). A review of discourses on gender, women and climate change (Arora-Jonson 2011) shows that while there are certain dif- ferences in perceptions about how women and men in developed and developing coun- tries contribute to climate change, women often find themselves to be more vulnerable and lacking in decision-making power within governance structures. Accordingly, the need for gender equity and full participation of both men and women is subsequently included in most relevant multilateral conventions and agreements. For instance, in one of the early multilateral agreements on environment conservation, the Convention of Bi- ological Diversity (1992: 2) recognises,
the vital role that women play in the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity and affirms the need for the full participation of women at all levels of policy-making and implementation for biological diversity conservation.
Article 1 (p.3) mentions that one of the objectives of this Convention is to conserve fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the utilisation of genetic resources. Alt- hough ‘fair and equitable sharing’ stands out as the main principle, there is no further mention of gender equality in this Convention. It seems that the recognition of women’s full participation is the strongest and the most explicit manifestation of mechanisms to address gender equity.
REDD+, with its focus on environmental conservation, sustainable management and livelihood development, is effectively built upon previous conventions and agree- ments. However, gender considerations were not officially mentioned until 2010 during the Conference of the Parties (CoP 16) of UNFCCC resulting in the Cancun Agreements. Since this section centres on gender considerations in REDD+ at the global level, I will focus on how language on gender considerations has evolved from the time of the Cancun Agreements to today. The Cancun Agreements, signed at the UNFCCC CoP 16 in 2010 in Cancun, Mexico, is the first and most important document pertaining to REDD+ Safe- guards and gender considerations. Among various documents produced at CoP 16, the texts directly relevant to safeguards and gender considerations are included in the Out- come of the work of the Ad Hoc Working Group on long-term Cooperative Action under
the Convention (AWG-LCA). It specifically acknowledges seven key principles to ‘pro- mote and support’ social and environmental safeguards in REDD+ (hereafter Cancun Safeguards):
When undertaking [REDD+] activities, the following safeguards should be pro- moted and supported:
a) That action complements or is consistent with the objectives of national forest programmes and relevant international conventions and agreements;
b) Transparent and effective national forest governance structures, taking into account national legislation and sovereignty;
c) Respect for the knowledge and rights of indigenous peoples and members of local communities, by taking into account relevant international obligations, na- tional circumstances and laws, and noting that the United Nations General As- sembly has adopted the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP);
d) The full and effective participation of relevant stakeholders, in particular in- digenous peoples and local communities;
e) That actions are consistent with the conservation of natural forests and bio- logical diversity, ensuring that the [REDD+] actions are not used for the conver- sion of natural forests, but are instead used to incentivise the protection and con- servation of natural forests and their ecosystem services, and to enhance other social and environmental benefits;
f) Actions to address the risks of reversals; g) Actions to reduce displacement of emissions.
Source: UNFCCC Decision 1/CP.16, Appendix I, p.26
There are several references to gender as part of REDD+ social safeguards in the AWG- LCA. Specifically, Paragraph 72 (FCCC/CP/2010/7/Add.1, p.13) requests that,
developing country Parties, when developing and implementing their national strategies or action plans, to address, inter alia, the drivers of deforestation and forest degradation, land tenure issues, forest governance issues, gender consid- erations and the safeguards identified in paragraph 2 of appendix I to this deci- sion, ensuring the full and effective participation of relevant stakeholders, inter alia indigenous peoples and local communities. [my emphasis]
Meanwhile, Paragraph 130 (page 22) on Capacity Building further explains that:
capacity-building support to developing country Parties should be enhanced with a view to strengthening endogenous capacities at the subnational, national or re- gional levels, as appropriate, taking into account gender aspects, to contribute to the achievement of the full, effective and sustained implementation of the Con- vention. [my emphasis]
These quotations are two of eight references to women and gender in Cancun Agree- ments, which were seen as the most positive signs for feminist observers. For example,
in their press release, the Women’s Environment and Development Organisation (WEDO) expressed that the Cancun Agreements marked a significant step in UNFCCC history, as there was no language on gender issues in the climate debate two years ago.18 The fact that CoP 16 was led by two women (UNFCCC Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres of Costa Rica and CoP President Patricia Espinosa of Mexico) might have con- tributed to this crucial change (Campense 2011: 6).
A closer look at Cancun Safeguards, however, reveals a less optimistic vision re- garding the potential of this multilateral agreement on addressing gender. The Cancun Safeguards make explicit reference to the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and gender aspects to ensure the ‘full and effective participation of relevant stake- holders’. What remains implicit is how these principles can be operationalised on the ground. For example, there is no explicit definition of what ‘full and effective participa- tion’ means for those concerned and no guidance on how to interpret or bring these gender considerations into practice, or how to ‘take into account gender aspects’ in building ca- pacity in developing countries.
The lack of clarity in the Cancun safeguards, however, must be situated within the global criticisms over REDD+. As Bee and Sijapati-Basnett (2016: 1) note, the Cancun Safeguards were adopted in response to the emerging concern of international researchers and social activists that the ‘infusion of financial capital through global environmental projects would exacerbate inequalities among already vulnerable groups’. The Cancun Safeguards, despite the weak language and vague instructions, formed the basic founda- tion for further efforts to strengthen gender-related initiatives in the following meetings of the Conference of Parties to the UNFCCC. The next meeting in Durban in 2011, for example, included ‘gender considerations’ and ‘gender-sensitive’ approaches in most of the crucial decisions on capacity building, selection of board members, governance and management structures, operation of the Green Fund as well as the development of na- tional action plans.
Meanwhile, UNDP, UNEP and FAO, together with the World Bank, have been leading two multilateral initiatives, namely the United Nations-REDD Programme (UN- REDD Program) and FCPF, to support developing countries, including Vietnam, to de- sign REDD+ action plans at the national level and implement REDD+ pilot projects or REDD+ demonstration activities at the sub-national and local levels. These two multilat-
18 See http://wedo.org/cancun-climate-agreements-taking-great-strides-for-womens-rights-and-gender-
eral initiatives have commissioned and published a number of documents related to gen- der analysis in REDD+. The UN-REDD Vietnam Programme, thanks to its role in sup- porting safeguards compliance and SIS development of REDD+ countries, has paid a great deal of attention to social safeguards in the last few years (SNV 2016: 13). Since 2012, UN-REDD’s Social and Environmental Principles and Criteria (SEPC) were pub- lished and subsequently adopted by the UN-REDD Global Program’s Policy Board as a guiding framework for REDD+ safeguards, which specifically emphasised the need to promote and enhance gender equity and women’s empowerment. The following year (2013), UN-REDD issued guidance on the gender-sensitive approach in REDD+ (see Box 2), whose objective they saw as being ‘to promote gender sensitive REDD+ processes and support UN-REDD Vietnam Programme partner countries and stakeholders in the preparation, development and implementation of gender sensitive national REDD+ strategies’ (my emphasis; UN-REDD Vietnam Programme, 2013: 1).
This document, despite its extensive discussion of the rationale of a gender-sensitive ap- proach and the key steps to achieve it, does not offer much to ‘support countries in the monitoring and reporting of REDD+ safeguards and to attend to issues such as women’s rights, livelihoods and participation in REDD+’ (Bee and Sijapati-Basnett, 2016: 2). Guidance on gender-sensitive REDD+ has not fully developed.
Similar to the Cancun Agreement, the language used in most of UN-REDD’s doc- uments (i.e. ‘promote’) shows a weak commitment to prioritise gender, gender equity and equality in REDD+. Furthermore, these documents are dominated by general and tech- nical recommendations. On the one hand, this makes it more difficult for countries in- volved in REDD+ to adopt and develop their own strategies and action plans. On the other, it gives them space to improvise, encouraging a country approach to safeguards (CAS), which is seen as favourable by REDD+ countries. The general framework for Box 2. Key steps to achieve gender sensitive approach (UN-REDD Vietnam Programme, 2013: 1)
Step 1: Establish a Baseline through a Gender Analysis
Step 2: Mobilise Gender Expertise and Create Partnerships
Step 3: Ensure the Effective Participation of Women
Step 4: Ensure a Gender Sensitive REDD+ Strategy
reporting on REDD+ environmental and social safeguards, however, is not completely absent. Specifically, in addition to the Cancun Safeguards in 2010, developing countries are required to develop and update a national-level Safeguards Information System (SIS) to provide information on how safeguards (including gender considerations) have been addressed and respected throughout the implementation of activities. It was not until the meeting of UNFCCC in Warsaw in 2013 (COP 20) that it was decided that the summary of information (SOI) on safeguards19 had to be submitted before the results-based pay-
ments for REDD+ countries could be officially triggered (Decision 9/CP19 Paragraph 4). During the latest meeting in France in 2015 (COP 21), further instructions as to what developing countries should provide in their SOI were agreed. These include:
-Information on national circumstances relevant to addressing and respecting the safeguards;
-A description of each safeguard in accordance with national circumstances; -A description of existing systems and processes relevant to addressing and re-
specting safeguards, including the SIS;
-Information on how each of the safeguards has been addressed and respected -Any other relevant information on the safeguards
Source: UNFCCC, Decision 17/CP.21 Paragraph 5
Overall, we can see the ambiguity of safeguards and gender particularly in REDD+ from a global perspective. There was a clear interest in promoting and enhancing gender con- siderations as REDD+ safeguards from the conference of parties of UNFCCC, starting with the Cancun Safeguards in 2010. This interest then developed into a more systematic framework where ensuring gender equality was addressed in the subsequent decisions of UNFCCC and the publications of UN-REDD Program. However, this interest has not resulted in an official commitment from either international agencies or countries to re- spect gender equity and equality. It is evident that no specific guidance for gender con- siderations in REDD+ was properly developed by either the UNFCCC or the UN-REDD Vietnam Programme in the period 2011 to 2016. Meanwhile, the results-based finance of REDD+ required countries to report on how REDD+ safeguards (including gender con- siderations) were addressed and respected through SIS. In other words, countries have been struggling with REDD+ safeguarding compliance: they were not told what they should do, but were required to report on what they have done so as to get the payments.
19 The document required to access results-based finance is a summary of information (SOI) on safeguards,
not the fully-developed safeguards information system (SIS). However, without specific guidance, it is up to each country to decide what they would like to include in both the safeguards information system and the summary of information on safeguards.
This leaves room for countries to manoeuvre, but also creates gaps and confusion while they attempt to mainstream gender in REDD+ on top of their existing policies on gender equity and resource governance. The following section will deal with these issues from a national perspective, taking Vietnam as a case study.