Meet 15 Women Leading the Fight Against Climate Change

From sinking islands to drought-ridden savannas, women bear an outsize burden of the global—warming crisis, largely because of gender inequalities. In many parts of the world, women hold traditional roles as the primary caregivers in families and communities, and, as the main providers of food and fuel, are more vulnerable when flooding and drought occur; the U.N. estimates 80% of those who have been displaced by climate change are women.

It's women who are leading the way in the struggle against the climate crisis.

Given their position on the front line of the climate-change battle, women are uniquely situated to be agents of change—to help find ways to mitigate the causes of global warming and to adapt to its impacts on the ground. This reality was recognized by the Paris Agreement, which specifically included the global need to further empower women in climate decision-making. Today, across the world, from boardrooms and policy positions to local communities, from science to activism, women everywhere are using their voices to take leadership and call for action on climate change. 

We’ve chosen 15 such women to highlight, in profiles spread throughout the rest of this issue of TIME. 

Read the story from Time magazine - “Meet 15 Women Leading the Fight Against Climate Change."

Extreme Weather Displaced a Record 7 Million in First Half of 2019

Extreme weather events displaced a record seven million people from their homes during the first six months of this year, a figure that put 2019 on pace to be one of the most disastrous years in almost two decades even before Hurricane Dorian battered the Bahamas. 

Stranded passengers in a railway station in Kolkata, India, in
May after trains were canceled because of Cyclone Fani. 

The Internal Displacement Monitoring Center, which compiles data from governments, United Nations humanitarian agencies and media reports, concluded in a report published Thursday that floods, landslides, cyclones and other extreme weather events temporarily displaced more people in the first half of this year than during the same period in any other year.

“In today’s changing climate, mass displacement triggered by extreme weather events is becoming the norm,” the center said in its report, adding that the numbers represent “the highest midyear figure ever reported for displacements associated with disasters.” The center has been publishing annual data since 2003. 

Read the story from The New York Times by Somini Sengupta - “Extreme Weather Displaced a Record 7 Million in First Half of 2019.”

Climate Change Is Driving People From Home. So Why Don’t They Count as Refugees?

UNITED NATIONS — More than 65 million people are displaced from their homes, the largest number since the Second World War, and nearly 25 million of them are refugees and asylum seekers living outside their own country.

A shipwrecked migrant in the Mediterranean in November.
New research suggests that weather shocks are spurring people
 to seek asylum in Europe. Credit

But that number doesn’t include people displaced by climate change.

Under international law, only those who have fled their countries because of war or persecution are entitled to refugee status. People forced to leave home because of climate change, or who leave because climate change has made it harder for them to make a living, don’t qualify.

The law doesn’t offer them much protection at all unless they can show they are fleeing a war zone or face a fear of persecution if they are returned home.

Read The New York Times story - “Climate Change Is Driving People From Home. So Why Don’t They Count as Refugees?”