Accelerating a Just Transition: UN Women Launches Gender Equality and Climate Policy Scorecard at COP30

^{Sarah Hendriks, Director of Policy, Programme and Intergovernmental Support, UN-Women (center left), Lorena Aguilar, Executive Director of the Kaschak Institute (center right)  and Nada Hossam Elbohi, Programme Manager, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, and representative of the Women and Gender Constituency (far right) and Rodrigo Herrera, Communications and Advocacy Specialist UN Women Regional Office for the Americas and the Caribbean (far left) at the press conference on November 21st at COP30 in Belem, Brazil. Photo: UN Women/ Virginia Lais Gontijo} 

At COP 30 in Belém, UN Women and the Kaschak Institute presentes the Gender Equality and Climate Policy Scorecard, a new global tool that assesses how far countries are integrating gender equality into their climate policies. The initiative offers the first comprehensive international framework to evaluate the gender dimension of the third iteration of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), the plans that guide each country’s action to deliver on the Paris Agreement. 

The Scorecard examines how governments are addressing gender inequalities across six dimensions: 

• economic security,
• unpaid care,
• health,
• gender-based violence,
• women’s participation and leadership, and
• gender mainstreaming in public policy. 

In this first release, 32 NDCs submitted up to 8 September 2025 were assessed. The Scorecard demonstrates that integrating gender into climate action is not only a matter of justice, it is a matter of effectiveness. When climate policies include women in all their diversity, results are more durable, equitable, and transformative. 

Progress and gaps 

Among the countries assessed, 26 include at least one gender-responsive commitment, but only ten take a comprehensive approach, with actions across five or six gender dimensions. Most measures focus on adaptation (38%) and cross-cutting actions (36%), while mitigation (23%) and loss and damage (3%) receive comparatively little attention.

The analysis shows that women’s economic security is the most frequently addressed area, with commitments to expand access to green jobs, technologies, and climate finance. Issues such as gender-based violence and health still appear only in a limited way in NDCs. In addition, few countries allocate dedicated budgets for gender-responsive actions, and many measures remain conditional on international cooperation and official development assistance.

Despite the gaps, the trend is positive: more countries are recognizing that a just transition must include women as central agents of solutions. Countries are also taking positive steps on the institutional arrangements for gender integration in climate processes, with 45% of countries involving their national gender equality mechanisms in climate coordination bodies. 

A tool for tracking and accountability 

The Scorecard offers a global, public database to enable governments and civil society to see how countries are performing, as well as to access hundreds of gender-responsive climate policies to inspire action and replication. The Scorecard will be updated as new climate plans are submitted throughout 2026. 

For UN Women, the instrument represents a decisive step toward accountability and transparency, helping to show where countries are advancing—and where further action is urgently needed. 

^{Sarah Hendriks, Director of Policy, Programme and Intergovernmental Support, UN-Women. Photo: UN Women/ Virginia Lais Gontijo} 

“While our Scorecard shows some uneven progress on gender equality, it demonstrates that more countries are embracing this agenda, not as a fringe or niche concern, but as central to their climate action. If we are to change course, it will be through unity: bridging our differences and channeling the collective energy, expertise and power of all women and girls. We remain hopeful that Parties will adopt a bold new Gender Action Plan that reflects this”. – Sarah Hendriks concluded.