23 October 2024–25 October 2024
Bangkok, Thailand
This summit aims to bring together girls and young women from across the Asia-Pacific region who are championing gender equality, equal accessibility to green skills, and addressing climate change.
The Girls Go Green Asia Pacific Summit is organized by UNICEF East Asia and Pacific, UNICEF Europe & Central Asia, UNICEF South Asia, UN Women Asia and the Pacific, UN Environment Programme Asia and the Pacific .
It is boiling Earth, boiling sea, and poised air. It doesn’t matter who you are; we share the same breath. We are all stakeholders.
If we cannot stop climate change, the lives stop.
Girls Building Greener Futures: Pathways to STEM and Sustainable Jobs for girls and young women
Green and sustainable jobs are roles that contribute to preserving or restoring the environment. These jobs can be found in various sectors, including renewable energy, energy efficiency, waste management, and sustainable agriculture. They focus on reducing carbon emissions, conserving natural resources, and promoting environmental sustainability. (What Is a Green Job ?, 2024)
As a woman in STEM and a girl in STEM, I have been dedicated to working to empower more women and girls in STEM. If we engage more girls and women, we will be able to promote gender equality in a technological and AI era and ensure sustainable growth that is gender-responsive.
Women and girls need more access to opportunity, ecopreneurship, leaders, and role models.
We need strategic insights, collaboration, and co-creations to transition to a just and green economy that women can thrive in.
Girls Led Panel Discussion on Girls Building Greener Futures: Pathways to STEM and Sustainable Jobs for girls and young women
Youth galvanize actions, when women have the STEM skills, the Asia and the Pacific region have the potential to leapfrog our progress on sustainable development, have an equitable and inclusive green economy, and have better social livelihoods.
Call to Action
This is a platform for change; multifaceted issues need multistakeholder solutions. We need gender equality, climate action, and collaboration with all stakeholders. It is a space and respect for our rights, our development, our hope, and our lives.
Transforming Education is Transforming Lives
Education will raise awareness. Girls will contribute and thrive in the green economy, green socio-economics, new jobs, spur adaptation, and innovating inclusive possibilities. Education will be the solution to end gender-based violence when women and girls, men and boys, and LGBTQIA+ are engaged to promote gender equality. Education Transform Lives
Education can improve water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH), the food system, and healthcare while ensuring our fundamental human rights.
Right education is raising the Right awareness.
Gender equality education is empowering communities. Climate Education is changing our world.
Transition the practice from School to work to the real-world problems
Training girls, the most marginalized girls who are not in education, employment, or training (NEETs) for green skills. Training girls should be inclusive, with diverse mentorship, education, and role models.
Whole of Society Actions for Green Girls
In order to achieve equality, we need everyone. We need girls and boys, women and men, people with disabilities, indigenous people, marginalized communities, migrants, and the elderly.
Girls bridge the gaps, girls change the world, girls are the key to reduce gender inequality.
Women empower society. Women support women. Women are the key to reduce gender inequality.
Girls Lead Climate Action
Meaningful and inclusive youth engagement and participation in all decision making processes is crucial. Government, private sector, and civil society must recognize children and youth, women and girls, men and boys, people with disabilities, and indigenous people as equal partners for implementing deep, rapid, and sustained emission reductions and climate actions in order to keep the 1.5 degree goal alive.
The UNFCCC process, Nationally Determined Contributions, and Road to COP29, Action for climate empowerment brings the opportunity for girls, boys, children, and youth to be engaged in the national action plan, climate policy, and negotiation. https://unfccc.int/youth-engagement-ramps-up-in-2023
Ensuring food security and safety for girls and marginalized communities is essential in adapting to and surviving climate change.
Green Digital Action & Artificial Intelligence future for Girls
Gender responsive growth in economy, technology, and sustainability needs women and girls as co-creators, collaborators, and co-implementors of the just transition.
Confidence is the power over her future; STEM skills for women are ensuring women’s economic empowerment.
In the rapid artificial intelligence era, we need unbiased artificial intelligence and unbiased data. Developing gender-responsive AI systems, free from bias, to create inclusive opportunities for all.
Disaggregate data, gender data, climate data, and multi-dimensional data will improve transparency in the NDC process, in equality and equity.
Climate Tech and Future of Work
Transition in green economy and green jobs for women and girls. We need to empower more girls and women to thrive in the knowledge economy, to have the knowledge work.
Artificial intelligence is saving risks, saving costs, and saving lives.
Developing countries in Asia and the Pacific often face limited data infrastructure, which restricts their ability to replicate models of sustainability. Leveraging available data and AI to address climate challenges, particularly through city-scale simulation data like Earth-2’s digital twin technology, offers potential solutions. Such high-resolution simulation data is instrumental for urban planning, disaster response, and understanding climate risks at a granular level.
City-scale simulation data is now incorporated into the Earth-2 planetary digital twin. NVIDIA demonstrates the combination of high-resolution simulation data from ICON, WRF, and PALM with Google Photoreal Tiles served by Cesium using the Earth-2 visualization service to help address questions in the urban environment. Earth-2 Goes Down to Street Level
As artificial intelligence holds an important role in creating solutions for sustainable progress, renewable energy is the way forward; solar power and occupation are driving women in decision-making, creating gender equality. These growing green jobs are economic opportunities for women, for girls to harness these important skills and create holistic solutions for the world.
Disaster Response and Preparation Early warning systems for all are an example of artificial intelligence that saves lives. Climate tech that needs to be timely, adaptive, and connected, with trust, build for the people and planet.
Investing in Girls is Investing in the Future
The investment that benefits everyone, everywhere, is investment in equality. It is a nexus lens — gender equality, climate action, a skilled workforce for women — that contributes economically.
Women and girls have often done the unpaid work, overload work, and underpaid work. We must ensure that our financing mechanism is helping the care economy, from the girls to women to thrive in the workplace to the elderly women who can have jobs, communities, and live healthy and happily.
The government’s fiscal policy should promote girls initiatives,, solutions and innovation. Increase in foreign direct investment, cross-border climate treaties that promote the most marginalized. The government also needs to ensure that the climate finance reaches the furthest behind, to the women and girls, to the developing countries, to the small island developing states, to the sea and ocean that we all shared.
Private sectors also play a key role in financing, in promoting environment, social, and government priorities, in responsible business practices, and in conducting human rights due diligence as well as child rights due diligence to ensure women and girls are respected and protected in all communities.
Public-Private-People partnerships are pivotal in gendered structural change and gendered systemic reforms that are just, equitable, and inclusive for every girls and women. This means more women at decision-making, women’s empowerment, more investment in women, valuing women’s work and women’s innovations, and supporting women’s choices.
Green Skills By Girls
UNICEF divides green skills into three interlinked categories: Occupational and technical skills are specifically used in green jobs, including STEM skills, engineering, science, and business skills, and project management. While these skills are similar to those used in other sectors, they need adaptations to address environmental challenges and emerging (Future Ready: Powering girls for a green economy transformation in Asia, 2024)
Figure 1.1 from Future Ready: Powering girls for a green economy transformation in Asia. (2024). https://www.unicef.org/eap/reports/future-ready-powering-girls-green-economy-transformation-asia.
References
What is a green job ? (2024, April 19). International Labour Organization. https://www.ilo.org/resource/article/what-green-job#:~:text=Green%20jobs%20are%20decent%20jobs,energy%20and%20raw%20materials%20efficiency
UNICEF, Skills for a green transition. (January 2024). https://www.unicef.org/reports/skills-green-transition.
ILO, Third Global Congress of Women in Politics and Governance, World Resources Institute (WRI), UNDP, UNEP, and the World Bank, New York Times, UNEP, ILO, IOE, ITUC, & Falise, T. (2008). GENDER EQUALITY AT THE HEART OF DECENT WORK. https://wrd.unwomen.org/sites/default/files/2021-11/8307_wcms1015051.pdf
Future Ready: Powering girls for a green economy transformation in Asia. (2024). https://www.unicef.org/eap/reports/future-ready-powering-girls-green-economy-transformation-asia.
