Skip to main content
Home

GEF Logo

GEF Logo

Search
  • Who We Are

    Organization

    • Overview
    • CEO and Chairperson
    • Focal Points
    • Secretariat Staff

    GEF Council

    • Members & Alternates
    • Work Programs
    • Meetings
    • Decisions

    Funding

    • Overview
    • GEF-8 Replenishment
    • GEF-7 Replenishment
    • Replenishment Documents
    • Overview
    • CEO and Chairperson
    • Focal Points
    • Secretariat Staff
  • What We Do

    Topics

    Topics

    • Amazon
    • Biodiversity
    • Blended Finance
    • Chemicals and Waste
    • Climate Change
    • Food Security
    • Forests
    • Illegal Wildlife Trade
    • International Waters
    • Land Degradation
    • Least Developed Countries Fund
    • Mercury
    • Special Climate Change Fund
    • Sustainable Cities
    • View All Topics >>

    Stakeholder Engagement

    Stakeholder Engagement

    • Civil Society Organizations
    • Country Support Program
    • Gender
    • Indigenous Peoples
    • Knowledge & Learning
    • Private Sector
  • Projects & Operations

    Projects

    Projects

    • Project Database
    • Templates
    • How Projects Work

    Countries

    Countries

    • Recipient Countries
    • Donor Countries
    • Participant Countries
    • Country Support Program

    Operations

    Operations

    • Conflict Resolution Commissioner
    • Knowledge & Learning
    • Policies and Guidelines
    • Results
  • Partners

    Partners

    • Countries
    • GEF Agencies
    • Conventions
    • Civil Society Organizations
    • Private Sector
    • Countries
    • GEF Agencies
    • Conventions
    • Civil Society Organizations
    • Private Sector
  • Newsroom

    Newsroom Menu Column 1

    • All
    • News
    • Feature Stories
    • Press Releases
    • Multimedia
    • Publications
    • Blog

    Newsroom Menu Column 2

    • GEF Logo
    • Partner News
    • Newsletter
    • Media Contacts
    • All
    • News
    • Feature Stories
    • Press Releases
    • Multimedia
    • Publications
    • Blog
  • Events
  • Search

Policy Development and Field Implementation: A two-way street

News
December 15, 2017
IFAD PASK
IFAD PASK

As the GEF's Gender Policy is approved by the GEF Council, the IFAD/GEF co-financed project Poverty Reduction Project in Aftout South and Karakoro – Phase II (PASK II) in Mauritania wins the 2017 IFAD gender award. PASK II addresses a major challenge in the country, the one related to water.

Mauritania experienced a dramatic reduction in rainfall in the last century, going from an average 1,100 mm/year in the early 1900s to the current 400 mm/year. In addition, most rainfall is concentrated during the rainy season, where isolated storms are more frequent, discharging large amounts of water over short periods of time, causing erosion and flooding. The water run-off does not recharge the water table and at the same time destroys the soil and causes damage to top soil.

Because of these periodic floods the villages cannot be located close to the riverbed, and women have to walk long distances to fetch water. In addition, male migration to find alternative sources of income is increasing and women have many more additional tasks to take care of.

Women and young people now make up more than 50 per cent of project participants and are benefitting from the project’s multi-dimensional approach to reducing poverty.

The GEF co-financing is specifically targeted to water for agriculture, with 40 women-managed market gardening areas developed, as well as productive micro-projects benefitting women.
Improvement in access to water have made a huge difference to the daily lives of women and girls, saving them an average of five hours per day and freeing their time and energy for education, money making activities and participation in the community.

Gas stove shops, harvesting non-timber forest products and rearing small livestock are a few of the activities enabling women and youth to earn an income. A total of 88 income-generating micro projects are benefitting over 1,500 women and 100 young people.

In order to achieve these results, the project has also invested in a wide range of cross-cutting educational activities including literacy and numeracy training for women producers’ associations, coupled with awareness campaigns on gender equality.

In the words of Ahmed Ould Amar, project coordinator ‘there is no such thing as men’s resistance, it is just a matter of lack of awareness’.

Experiences like this one in Mauritania, or the one of the IFAD/GEF Agricultural Value Chains Support Project – Extension (PAFA) in Senegal (that won the IFAD gender award last year) have fed into the GEF gender policy development process, that has been highly participatory by calling for the contribution and the concrete field experiences of all the GEF agencies.

Now that the GEF Gender Policy has been approved, we expect to see gender and environmental challenges increasingly recognised as interrelated and addressed consistently.


This story was originally published by IFAD

Topics

Climate Change Adaptation
Gender
Least Developed Countries Fund - LDCF

Countries

Mauritania

Related News

Tarawa atoll of Kiribati; green island peninsula with buildings and blue ocean waters
Feature Story

How Kiribati is shoring up food security and community resilience

March 13, 2023
Green mountain landscape with valleys and thick clouds above
Feature Story

Lessons from AICCA's work to make electricity generation more climate-resilient in Ecuador

March 6, 2023
Image
Cover image for publication "SCCF: Serving the Adaptation Needs of SIDS and Enhancing Technology Transfer, Private Sector Engagement, and Innovation for All"
Publication

SCCF: Serving the Adaptation Needs of SIDS and Enhancing Technology Transfer, Private Sector Engagement, and Innovation

GEF Updates

Subscribe to our distribution list to receive the GEF Newsletter.

Sign up

GEF Logo

Follow Us

GEF Affiliated Sites

  • GEF Portal
  • Independent Evaluation Office
  • Scientific and Technical Advisory Panel
  • Small Grants Programme

Who We Are

  • GEF Secretariat Staff
  • Conflict Resolution Commissioner
  • Council Members & Alternates
  • Focal Points
  • Careers
  • Legal
  • Contact Us

© 2023 Global Environment Facility, All Rights Reserved.  |   Legal