New research to understand the impacts of climate change on women tea workers

Wednesday 9 March 2022

Our world is changing, and since #COP26 discussions about how to keep global warming below 1.5C are still at the forefront of the climate agenda. While ambitious targets have been set across many businesses and industries, working out how to decarbonise supply chains is quite a complex matter that many grapple to fully understand.

That’s why it’s so important that we are collaborating on a research partnership through the FCDO’s Work and Opportunities for Women (WOW) Programme.

The programme will look to understand more about the huge impact climate change will have on women workers in supply chains.

We know that women are more likely to experience the negative impacts of climate change and they are 14 times more likely to die in an environmental disaster and an estimated 80% of people displaced by climate change are women [1].

We also know that many women tea workers and farmers are often ‘invisible’ in supply chains even though they make up most of the tea pickers and workers globally.

Over the next few months, we will specifically be looking to map out key actions and recommendations to help women tea farmers in Malawi and Kenya and to get a better understanding of the challenges ahead for women in supply chains as the climate crisis continues. This research will be the first of its kind with new insights for the tea industry.

Click here to see the final report. 

As consumer demand puts pressure on businesses to play a bigger part to slow down the climate crisis, it is important that this research inspires more solution focused responses that clearly recognise the important role female workers play throughout all supply chains.

[1] United Nations Development Programme. (2016). Gender, climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction: training module 2. Retrieved from https://www.undp.org/publications/gender-and-climate-change

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