Photo by Survial Media Agency
As a “triple-COP” year, 2026 is a critical moment for global climate and environmental governance. The UN conferences on climate, biodiversity, and land degradation offer numerous opportunities to ensure that timely, accurate, and inclusive data inform global efforts to build gender-transformative and climate-resilient futures.
Advocating for data-informed policy change is at the core of the Gender Environment and Data Alliance’s (GEDA) work. To prepare for these upcoming advocacy opportunities, GEDA met with the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) gender team and the UN Women research and data leads who oversee the “Progress of the World’s Women” flagship report.
This deep dive into two key policy instruments opened the door for GEDA to discuss strategies for enhancing data collection, production, and use. Check out videos of each presentation below.
The recent adoption of the Belém Gender Action Plan (GAP) at COP30 reaffirmed the need for more and better data. With a focus on implementation, the ambitious GAP aims to accelerate progress toward creating gender equitable, inclusive, and sustainable societies — a goal that is virtually impossible without inclusive data.
Divided into five priority areas, the Belém GAP highlights mechanisms to:
Hear more from the UNFCCC Gender Secretariat about how the Belém GAP integrates data in the video below:
Official UN climate negotiations are not the only policy and advocacy spaces where inclusive progress requires gender and climate data. Climate change remains a catastrophic obstacle to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), including SDG 5 on gender equality. In recognition of this barrier, the latest edition of UN Women’s flagship report, “Progress on the World’s Women,” will focus on transformation through feminist climate justice.
The report, launching at COP31 in Ankara, uses data from diverse sources to demonstrate the impacts of climate change and environmental degradation on gender equality and how advocates can use this information to influence policy change. One mechanism is to use the UN Women Gender Equality and Climate Policy Scorecard to assess climate policies from a gender perspective. With 50 indicators across six dimensions, the scorecard is an important entry point for mainstreaming gender in national climate policies.
Learn more about how the report and scorecard feed into UN Women’s advocacy and policy goals in the video below:
From the Commission on the Status of Women and the UN’s High-level Political Forum to COP31, there are numerous arenas for policy influence in the coming year. Join advocates and coalitions, like the Gender and Environment Data Alliance (GEDA), to ensure that data remain on the agenda and are used to reimagine our collective futures.
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