[East Sumba, 19 September 2025] As part of the 2025 National Environment Week (PNLH), 109 participants from various regions demanded that the state implement concrete and sustainable solutions to guarantee recognition, protection, and the rights of women and vulnerable groups who face layered impacts from ecological disasters and the climate crisis in Indonesia.

Amid escalating climate-related disasters such as floods, droughts, water scarcity, and food crises, women from local communities across Indonesia have proven themselves to be at the forefront of building locally rooted solutions. Yet their contributions are often overlooked in national and global policy frameworks.

Although recent years have seen efforts toward gender inclusion through policy documents such as the National Action Plan on Gender and Climate Change (RAN-GPI), challenges remain significant—particularly regarding the meaningful participation of grassroots women.

“Many people assume that we cannot be independent, even though I live alone at home without children or a husband. With our identities, we need access to information and meaningful participation that supports us—not pity,” said Yustina May Nggiri, a woman with disabilities from PAHDIS.

Ecological and Climate Disasters Worsen Gender Inequality

Data from Solidaritas Perempuan show that in 57 villages across Indonesia, 3,624 women have become victims and experienced impoverishment due to extractive development (Annual Report 2024). These conditions exacerbate the impacts of climate disasters, making access to clean water, food, and livelihoods—largely sustained by women’s labor—even more difficult. Women’s struggles to achieve sovereignty have also exposed them to structural and cultural violence due to their intersecting identities, including intimidation and criminalization.

“We fight not for ourselves, but for the next generation. Women have long understood that land is ancestral heritage. Yet the geothermal project in Poco Leok has destroyed the livelihoods of women farmers and the identity of Indigenous communities in Poco Leok,” said women farmers and Indigenous women from Poco Leok.

“Drought, water crises, and locust infestations have placed layered burdens on women. We must carry water for two kilometers and spend a long time filling a five-liter jerrycan,” said an Indigenous woman from Ndapayami Village.

Community Knowledge: Proven Solutions

In several communities, including those in East Nusa Tenggara and Maluku, women have initiated adaptation practices rooted in local wisdom—from climate-resilient farming systems and water management to marine and forest ecosystem conservation. These practices have proven effective and are grounded in values of solidarity, sustainability, and harmonious relationships with nature.

“We gather forest yams (Iwwi) and manage them as part of our food sovereignty in facing the climate crisis,” said Garselia, an Indigenous woman from Mbatakapidu, East Sumba.

“As young people from Maluku, we organize ourselves and work with communities to align perspectives and coordinate movements, such as advocacy efforts in Haya, Central Maluku. We combine intergenerational local knowledge held by community members with modern scientific knowledge gained from universities to build political education, data inventories, and spaces of solidarity across generations. Today, as young people, we are not only losing a healthy environment—we also fear losing cycles of local knowledge and the ability to imagine a better quality of life in the face of an impending ecological collapse,” said Yolis Atikah, a young woman from Maluku.

Community knowledge remains an inseparable part of the struggle toward Climate Justice, including the understanding that forests, land, and seas are sources of life when responding to disasters and ecological crises.