Impact of environmental crime on indigenous women

What constitutes an environmental crime has long been subject to debate. However, human-induced environmental degradation and biodiversity loss are both pertinent. Local communities, largely indigenous groups, living around biodiverse areas comprising forests, mountains and marine ecosystems stand to be among the first affected.

The presence of illegal extractive activities, whether mining or logging, attracts men from outside these areas and effectively ‘masculinizes’ these territories. This disrupts regular life and threatens the safety of women, who often have to venture into forests to carry out domestic activities. The impact varies from community to community and is linked to gender roles and patriarchy, and sometimes includes physical violence.

As a part of the Resilience Fund’s broader work on women’s resilience to organized crime, this exploratory policy brief unpacks the ways in which women are struggling, adapting and responding to the impacts of environmental degradation and biodiversity loss caused by the illegal exploitation of forest regions and their surrounds, especially in rural and indigenous habitats.

Read more and download the report and the policy brief