To Accelerate Climate Action, More Women Must Rule The World - Forbes

To Accelerate Climate Action, More Women Must Rule The World
WARSAW, POLAND - JUNE 27: (EDITORIAL USE ONLY)(EXCLUSIVE COVERAGE) Beyoncé performs onstage during ... [+] the “RENAISSANCE WORLD TOUR” at PGE Narodowy on June 27, 2023 in Warsaw, Poland. (Photo by Kevin Mazur/WireImage for Parkwood)

‘Who run the world? Girls!’ proclaims Beyoncé, and looking around at recent presidents and prime ministers - Jacinda Ardern, Ursula von der Leyen, Mary Robinson, Angela Merkel, Tsai Ing-wen, Mette Frederiksen, Laura Chinchilla Miranda, Theresa May, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Katerina Sakellaropoulou, Christine Kangaloo and an expected new crop of women from this super year of elections – she looks to have a point.

Women’s leadership and inclusion is vital to increasing international and planetary stability. Last year Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg said female leaders ‘don’t go to war’ and research suggests the traits associated with women leadership can keep peace treaties alive for longer. And while women and girls experience the greatest impacts of climate change, more women decisionmakers often means more climate action.

Yet too often men are propelled into decision-making roles, while women are left trailing in their wake.

Think of COP28 in Dubai in 2023, where fewer than one in five heads of delegation, a mere 19 per cent, was a woman, and the palaver at the end of last year when only after a backlash did the COP29 president add 12 women — including Umayra Taghiyeva, the country’s deputy environment minister — to the previously all-male organizing committee for the next global climate summit Azerbaijan will host in December.

This telling presumption that women’s skills and ideas are secondary was borne out recently in an epic moment of mansplaining that went viral when PGA pro and instructor Georgia Ball had her swing criticized by a man off-camera. The clip has been viewed more than 10 million times.

If emissions are to be brought down in line with climate science, women everywhere must stand up, speak out and act to slash emissions and lead the change to a more sustainable and a more equitable world.

But there are challenges to women being heard everywhere. Women continue to be under-represented on company boards and while progress has ticked up in some countries like the UK, there remains a dearth of women in corporate leadership positions. In 2022, women accounted for just 16 per cent of FTSE 350 chairs and about 8 per cent of chief executives.

This imbalance has implications for everyone. A critical mass of 30 per cent of women on company boards is considered enough to improve climate governance and slow the rate of emissions growth to 0.6 per cent compared to 3.5 per cent for companies without any women on the board.

This continuing lack of equality between men and women is detrimental to climate action. Companies with more gender-diverse boards are more advanced in their disclosure decision-making on climate action. They are twice as likely to have committed to net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, and 25 per cent more likely to have medium and long-term emissions reduction targets compared to less-gender-diverse boards.

Similarly, a recent report from the European Investment Fund shows women-led firms have higher environmental, social, and governance scores than other companies, and that businesses with a greater representation of women in leadership positions have better track records of adopting environmentally friendly practices.

There is no shortage of inspiring women demanding and creating change — think Christiana Figueres, one of the architects of the Paris Agreement, or Mia Mottley, the Prime Minister of Barbados, a powerful orator and the brains behind the Bridgetown Initiative, setting out how a new global finance mechanism can be created to channel funds to support climate adaptation.

Inside every company, there are women showing how change can happen and helping their younger colleagues to take the space and move forward the transition towards a cleaner, fairer world. Research shows the number of women in has grown exponentially and with women like Google’s Kate Brandt, Amazon’s Kara Hurst and Lafarge Holcim’s Nollaig Forrest leading the green charge, and Novozymes CEO Ester Baiget, the business shift to decarbonization is accelerating.

Among the younger generation, award-winning musician Billie Eilish was named by TIME Magazine as one of the 100 most influential climate leaders in business in 2023 for her actions to reduce emissions. She doesn’t fly by private jet, prioritizes plant-based food and renewable energy at her concerts, and has created Overheated a climate action event bringing together youth activists, musicians and designers.

But women leading in the climate space is not always an easy move. Recently, an article in the Financial Times suggested women are more likely to rise to the top when a job is risky and less appealing to men, describing them as being “cast off the glass cliff”. With temperatures hitting record highs, climate impacts offering a snapshot of horrors to come, and companies and countries acknowledging the transformation is going to be extremely difficult, what could be more “glass cliff” than climate action?

Women, with allies who espouse and respect the skills and possibilities they bring, giving them space to collaborate and lead, are well placed to drive the development and implementation of meaningful climate action. The political reality, however, is that there were only 26 female heads of state and government as of January this year.

Imagine what we’d achieve in a world where more women ruled.

Happy International Women’s Day!