CBD and UN-Women’s Expert Workshop in New York held discussions on creating a gender-responsive global biodiversity framework (Photo: UN Women)

Considering the importance of integrating cross-cutting issues such as gender in global biodiversity conservation and development, the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) focuses on mainstreaming gender perspectives in development and environment programmes in the Hindu Kush Himalaya (HKH), which is an important region rich in biodiversity. Furthering the Centre’s commitment to gender equality and transformative change in sustainable and equitable mountain development in the HKH, Chanda Gurung Goodrich – Senior Gender Specialist, Gender Lead at ICIMOD – participated in the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and UN-Women’s Expert Workshop “Developing recommendations for a gender-responsive post-2020 global biodiversity framework”.

The workshop – convened at the UN-Women Headquarters, New York, United States, from 11 to 12 April 2019 – was organized by the Secretariat of the CBD, United Nations Environment Programme, and UN-Women. It focused on developing possible objectives, key messages, and substantive elements of a gender-responsive post-2020 global biodiversity framework. It also discussed steps for enhanced gender-responsive implementation.

The main workshop outcome will be a report providing key messages and recommendations for reflecting gender issues in the post-2020 global biodiversity framework – to be disseminated to parties to the CBD and other stakeholders. The report will be an input to the following:

• Submissions by the parties and observers to the CBD on the preparatory process for the post-2020 global biodiversity framework
• Sub-regional, regional, and global consultations on and negotiations of the post-2020 global biodiversity framework scheduled for 2019–2020
• The CBD Secretariat’s post-2020 discussion paper for consideration of the post-2020 global biodiversity framework

The workshop report and inputs provided by the participants will also serve as resources for the review of the implementation of the CBD’s 2015–2020 Gender Plan of Action and contribute to the fifth edition of the Global Biodiversity Outlook and the second edition of the Local Biodiversity Outlooks. Besides the organizers, there were 38 workshop participants from various international organization and government institutions from Asia, Africa, Europe, North America, Central and South America, and the Pacific Islands.

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