Opportunities for women in the green economy and environmental sectors

Abstract South Africa's National Environmental Management Act (Act 107 of 1998) recognises the important role of women and youth in environmental management and development. To this end, significant strides have been made by the country in gender mainstreaming. The “Environment Sector Gender Framework” and the “Framework and Strategy Toward Gender Mainstreaming in the Environment Sector 2016–2021” are some of the policy frameworks that have been implemented. In addition, a number of initiatives and programmes such as the Green Fund, established in April 2012, the Groen Sebenza Learnership Programme, and environmental conservation through the Expanded Public Works Programme have been developed. Using a mixed method research design approach, the paper attempts to answer the following questions: Are the concerns and perspectives of women sufficiently integrated in the green economy and environmental sector policies and programmes? What green economy and environmental sector projects are women involved in and what is the proportion of women involved in such projects? Through simple random sampling, the study established that space has been created for women involvement in the green economy and environmental sectors. However, there still remains a need to raise awareness of the available opportunities and interventions to build capacity at project conceptualisation and management levels. The involvement of women further requires meaningful public participation, social inclusion, and the devolution and decentralisation of decision‐making processes.