The Accelerator will support private sector companies improve the gender responsiveness of their corporate climate governance. It will also help governments to promote gender-sensitive climate sector policies, thereby accelerating their green transition to meet Paris Agreement targets, the UNFCCC’s gender action plan and key Sustainable Development Goals.

The launch ceremony took place on Gender Day, Monday, 14 November, on the sidelines of the 27th annual global climate summit (COP27) in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt. It brought together global leaders, heads of development finance institutions and private sector business representatives.

Egypt has called the global community to action on gender equality in climate action, stating that now was the time to show progress on the ground.

In introductory remarks, Egypt’s Minister of International Cooperation, Rania Al-Mashat, stressed “commitment clarity, and credibility” as the important features of this initiative. The Minister said: “COP27 strengthens international effort to move from pledges to implementation and achieve the goals of the Paris agreement. The launch of this accelerator in collaboration between the Government and development partners, strengthens gender equality efforts, enhances climate action and adaptation efforts to ensure women’s more effective participation. It also creates opportunities that enhances women’s development and key lessons to accelerate gender equality at work tackiling climate change.”

EBRD’s President, Odile Renaud-Basso, said: “Women are a transformative force for economies. We need to harness their ingenuity and their potential and their business acumen to identify and deliver the solutions to the huge challenges we face, to tackle climate change. Our role is to work collectively on creating better access to green skills and jobs, more support for innovative entrepreneurship in the green economy, and scale up investments into sustainable business practices. “

Cassilde Breniere, Deputy Chief Operations Officer of AFD, said: “This initative is in line with AFD feminist policy. AFD is proud to showcase that more than 60% of our climate finance contribute to achieving gender equality. AFD projects have shown that adaptation strategies are more effective when they involve women. Women are a force of structural transformation and we need women to reach our climate ambition.”.

Gareth Philips, Manager of Climate and Environment Finance, added: “We at the African Development Bank Group believe this is a step in the right direction. We need to get better at tracking, and we are committed to working with African governments and development partners to develop and fine-tune tools to improve on gender equality in climate change”.