Locations
Gender and Climate Finance Collective (GCFC)
Advancing gender-responsive climate finance across Asia and the Pacific
Background
Climate change is reshaping societies worldwide, including across Asia and the Pacific, through more frequent extreme weather events, livelihood disruption, and the deepening of existing inequalities. While these impacts are experienced across societies, their consequences are unevenly distributed across populations.
In many communities in the region, women face disproportionate climate-related impacts because of persistent inequalities in access to assets, income, finance, mobility, and decision-making authority.
The Gender and Climate Finance Collective (GCFC) responds to this imbalance, recognising that climate change reinforces existing gender inequalities and that financing choices influence whether climate responses mitigate or reproduce those disparities.
By 2030, global modelling suggests that climate change could push more than 60 million additional people into extreme poverty under a high-impact climate scenario, with women and girls facing disproportionate risks due to existing economic and social inequalities.
Who we are
The GCFC is a regional initiative that brings together governments, civil society, private sector, think-tanks and development partners to exchange knowledge, provide guidance, and expand gender-responsive and inclusive climate-finance solutions.
Our partnership
Building on joint collaboration since 2021, the platform is co-led by UNDP, UNEP, and UN Women, bringing together their respective strengths: UNDP’s development expertise and secretariat capacity, UNEP’s environmental and climate mandate, and UN Women’s gender-equality focus. Together, they form a regional advisory and learning platform aimed at reshaping climate finance to be gender-responsive, inclusive, and ultimately transformative.
Our work is informed by and builds upon the UNDP Climate Finance Network (CFN) and UNEP/UN Women EmPower: Women for Climate-Resilient Societies programme (EmPower), leveraging their experience in bridging climate policy, gender inclusion, and finance. The CFN is supported by the UK FCDO and Sweden Sida, and EmPower is supported by the Governments of Germany, New Zealand, Sweden and Switzerland.
Through this partnership, GCFC brings together governments, development partners, women's rights organisations, civil society, private sector stakeholders, and researchers around a shared agenda: to embed gender and social inclusion across climate finance reforms, planning, implementation, and monitoring of investments.
What we do
- Provide peer review and technical inputs to policy tools and planning frameworks.
- Promote the use of gender-responsive budgeting, climate budget tagging, and inclusive planning tools.
- Facilitate dialogue between national and sub-national actors to align gender and climate priorities.
- Organize regional peer learning events.
- Document and share lessons from CFN and non-CFN countries.
- Host thematic sessions on emerging issues (e.g., just transitions, local finance, intersectionality).
- Promote the use of gender-responsive climate finance tools at local and national levels.
- Facilitate dialogue between public institutions, private investors, and capital market actors.
- Share examples of gender-smart climate investments, including blended finance and green bonds.
- Co-develop advocacy briefs and talking points.
- Support CFN participation in COP, UNFCCC, SDG finance, and regional platforms.
- Highlight country innovations through blogs, briefs, and side events.
Strategy to Scale webinar series
Webinar 1: From Commitments to Capital: Climate Finance for the Belém Gender Action Plan
The first GCFC webinar brought together over 150 participants from across Asia and the Pacific, opening the new regional “Strategy to Scale” series on gender and climate finance.
It marked an early step in the post‑COP30 regional dialogue on how to fund the Belém Gender Action Plan and what it means for gender-responsive climate finance.
Webinar summary | Webinar recording | UNFCCC Presentation: Belém Gender Action Plan | UNEP Presentation: Advancing Gender Empowerment for Financial Institutions
Webinar 2: Climate Capital for Women-Focused MSMEs
In the Asia-Pacific, MSMEs comprise up to 99% of all businesses, with women leading nearly a quarter of these firms. Despite their central role in local resilience and food systems, women-led MSMEs face significant structural barriers in accessing climate finance.
In our second session of the "Strategy to Scale" series, we explored actionable solutions to bridge the financing gap—from inclusive de-risking instruments to regulatory shifts—ensuring that climate capital reaches the women-led enterprises that form the backbone of regional resilience.
Webinar 3: Closing the Protection Gap: Climate Risk Insurance and Social Protection for Women
Our third webinar explored how climate risk insurance and social protection can work together to strengthen the resilience of women in Asia and the Pacific. While gender commitments in climate policy are widespread, there remains a critical gap in creating gender-responsive financial systems that are truly accessible. The event focused on how protection solutions can be made trusted, scalable, and financially viable for vulnerable women.
Webinar 4: Thematic Bonds for Gender-Responsive Climate Action
Our fourth webinar examined how thematic bonds can mobilize capital to advance both climate action and gender equality. While the global sustainable bond market has grown into a multi-trillion-dollar industry, gender-focused bonds still represent only about 3 percent of this broader market. The event focused on how issuers, investors, and market builders can move beyond separate labels toward credible, investable instruments that integrate gender at the design stage to deliver verifiable, dual-impact outcomes.
Resources
About and contact
About EmPower: Women for Climate-Resilient Societies Programme
Jointly implemented by UN Women and the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) with support from the Governments of Germany, New Zealand, Sweden and Switzerland, EmPower is dedicated to empowering women and marginalized groups to take the lead in building climate-resilient communities.
About the Climate Finance Network (CFN)
The UNDP Climate Finance Network (CFN) supports countries in the Asia-Pacific region to strengthen their climate finance systems to enhance the effectiveness of climate finance and unlock private and blended investments needed to meet national climate goals. Operating as a regional platform, the Network promotes peer learning, knowledge exchange, and technical assistance across ministries of finance, planning, and environment. Its work is supported by the United Kingdom’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida).
For more information, please contact:
Mamta Kohli, Regional Gender, Social Inclusion and Adaptation Specialist, Climate Finance Network, UNDP
Athena Galao, Programme Coordinator for Gender and Climate Action, UN Women