Gains made on Ukraine gender equality at peril for conflict

UN Women

Geneva, 25 Apr (Kanaga Raja) – The war in Ukraine is posing additional risks to civilians, particularly women and children, and could also compromise any gains that have been made to achieve gender equality and empower women, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

In an Information Note, FAO said that in the last few years, Ukraine has made modest gains on reducing gender inequalities, ranking 74th out of 156 countries according to the Gender Gap Index.

However, these achievements were already under threat after eight years of conflict in the east of the country, and the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, it added.

“The current crisis will add to this complex situation and compromise any gains that have been made to achieve gender equality and empower women,” said FAO.

Ukraine has more than 130 ethnic groups and many minority language groups; and an unusual demographic profile with more women (54 percent) than men (46 percent), said the Information Note.

The gap was driven by three factors: migration of young people, fertility rates below the replacement rate and the high gap between women and men’s life expectancy, which reaches up to 11 years in favour of women, it added.

“Older people constitute a highly vulnerable group in Ukraine and represent about 30 percent of the people in need in the conflict-affected areas, including Donetska and Luhanska, and most of them are women.”

Gender intersects with several other social dimensions affecting the vulnerabilities of distinct groups, including the Roma population, people living with disabilities, women in rural communities, in displacement and conflict zones, and LGBTQI+ communities, said FAO.

FAO said that if the military operations continue for an extended time, in addition to the anticipated disruption of agricultural production and trade, the reduced investments and the deterioration of land and infrastructure, there may be significant changes in sex and age patterns of mortality and (out) migration, with important consequences for gender equality, family dynamics and social relations.

“This would exacerbate the demographic imbalance already present,” it added.

FAO noted that food insecurity was already on the rise in Ukraine prior to the war outbreak due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

FAO said that its Food Insecurity Experience Scale (FIES) data show that the prevalence of moderate or severe food insecurity (SDG indicator 2.1.2) among women has increased from 17.3 percent in 2019 to 28.9 percent in 2021 and among men from 13.3 to 24 percent in the last two years.

While the differences between women and men are not statistically significant, the trend over time is consistent and suggest that women have been more food insecure than men over the past eight years, it added.

It said experiences from around the world have demonstrated that the war is the major driver of food insecurity and malnutrition, both acute and chronic.

“By directly constraining agricultural production, limiting economic activity and raising prices, the conflict will further undercut the purchasing power of affected populations, with consequent increases in food insecurity and malnutrition. In some cities, as a result of isolation, people are facing severe shortages of food, water and energy supplies.”

FAO said that entrenched inequalities imply that women and girls often eat less and last, and their nutritional needs may be side-lined during conflicts.

When food is scarce, families increasingly resort to negative coping mechanisms to survive, it added.

Moreover, it said that with a 22 percent gender pay gap and a 32 percent pension gap, women-headed households, which already represented 71 percent of the total households in the government-controlled areas prior to the current escalations, are more vulnerable to the conflict.

As in many parts of the world, Ukrainian women are primarily responsible for food security and nutrition within their household, it noted.

They take on a disproportionate share of unpaid care and domestic work, resulting in a “double” or “triple burden”.

Married women in Ukraine spend an average of 24.6 hours per week on domestic chores, compared to 14.5 hours for married men.

“Increasing food insecurity and water and energy scarcity, as a result of the crisis, may place women and girls at higher risk of domestic violence due to heightened tensions in the household and communities,” said FAO.

According to the Information Note, the crisis will also diminish rural people’s access to economic opportunities, nutritious food and water, and increase the workloads of those remaining in the affected areas.

FAO said that the disruption of infrastructure and lack of mobility pose a significant risk to women and girls, who constitute more than 72 percent of social protection recipients, reducing their access to healthcare, social services and social assistance such as cash and asset transfers.

Furthermore, according to the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), about 80,000 women will give birth in the next three months in Ukraine – many of whom are left without access to critical maternal health care as the conflict continues to disrupt essential services.

According to the Information Note, violence against women and girls is a widespread and persistent human rights violation during conflict. For millions of women and girls, including those who have lived in the shadow of conflict in eastern Ukraine, gender-based violence (GBV) is a serious problem.

According to a 2019 UNFPA study, 75 percent of women in the country declared to have experienced some form of violence since age 15, and one in three suffered physical or sexual violence.

FAO said that as history has repeatedly shown, conflicts increase the exposure of women and girls to war crimes, including arbitrary killings, rape and trafficking.

“Rural women and girl survivors of GBV in Ukraine face additional obstacles in accessing specialized assistance and protection,” it added.

In response to the crisis, FAO said it is crucial that policy-makers, planners and the humanitarian and development aid community address the specific needs of affected men, women, girls and boys from different socio-economic, ethnic and age groups, and consider their key roles as food producers, farm managers, processors, traders, wage workers, innovators and entrepreneurs.

“It is also essential to recognize the skills and high potential of women and youth as agents of reconstruction and resilience builders, and create new opportunities to enhance their livelihoods, foster their agency, and engage them in the decision-making process and in building back their societies,” it added.

According to the Information Note, the possible responses to the crisis in Ukraine include:

1. Collect and analyze sex, age and disability-disaggregated data to produce the evidence base for gender and age- responsive planning and mitigation measures, and to monitor the gender-related impacts of new policies, strategies and investments linked to agriculture and rural development, food and nutrition security.

This will also imply conducting gender-sensitive vulnerability assessments to analyse the specific constraints of women and men to access resources, agricultural inputs, services and local institutions.

2. Undertake protection risk analysis among the affected and most vulnerable women and men of different socio- economic, ethnic and age groups, and adopt special protection measures to make sure that interventions do not inadvertently put women, girls or other vulnerable groups at risk of GBV or discrimination.

3. Scale up gender- and shocks-responsive social protection measures (including in-kind assistance, food packages and essential hygiene products) to support affected populations in order to alleviate poverty and absorb the shocks, when markets are not functioning or prices of essential products increase, safeguard their productive assets and avoid harmful coping strategies, such as selling off assets and reducing food intake.

This could involve expanding the coverage of existing social protection programmes or introducing new ones to reach the poor and vulnerable populations that currently cannot access them; and using available delivery mechanisms of national social protection systems to give humanitarian assistance to refugees and asylum seekers.

Social assistance programmes could also include the provision of temporary employment, cash transfers, small grants or agricultural inputs to support informal, part-time seasonal workers, women and youth to manage risks, taking into account their greater care responsibilities and limited mobility.

4. Set up financial and advisory services targeting the economic activities of women and youth and support the creation of women self-help and youth groups to increase their resilience capacities. This could imply establishing relief funds and provide extension services to support women-run business in value chains that are still operational.

5. Support the productive capacity of men and women farmers during and after the conflict by ensuring equitable access to the productive resources, agricultural inputs and services required for the next production season.

This will imply equipping farmers, including elderly and people with disabilities, with the knowledge and resources required to produce and consume nutritious foods during the next 3 months to prevent negative coping strategies; and provide short-cycle vegetable seeds, including potatoes, a key staple of the Ukrainian diet, to improve food security and nutrition and enhance income-generating opportunities.

6. Establish inclusive and active consultations with affected women, men, youth and local actors in programmatic response, information and data gathering, from needs assessments and targeting to monitoring and evaluation.

7. Coordinate with other international and national organizations, humanitarian actors and inter-agency clusters working towards gender equality, and partner with local women’s organizations and committees working with different minority groups.

8. Include women and girls in the peacebuilding and peace-managing processes. The United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 adopted in October 2000 (S/RES/1325) on Women, Peace and Security reaffirms women’s important role in the prevention and resolution of conflicts, peace negotiations, humanitarian response and post-conflict reconstruction.

-  Third World Network