The amount of hungry people has already climbed over 1,02 billion by the estimates of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN. Still the commitment of governments and donors is lacking behind. With increasing extreme weather events which are taking place due to climate change, the vulnerability of people to sudden onset disasters, was it natural or economically related, will deteriorate the food insecurity and hunger status of the world’s poor. This will make the future prone to conflicts over decreasing food and water resources.Decreased access to other stable energy and natural resources will escalate the need of the poor. By 2020 it is estimated that countries reliant on rain-fed agriculture will suffer reduction up to 50% of their normal crop yields. In areas, where scarce and more restricted freshwater resources are diminishing, the exposure of 75-250 million people to water stress is predicted to happen. Low-quality water is already decreasing crop production in many areas and thus increasing the pressure of migration of people to new arable areas, increasing the possibility to complex disasters where conflicts restrict the access of people to land and resources and thus decrease the overall food availability for the populations. Climate change is predicted to have most adverse effects on Sub-Saharan Africa where the impact on crops which are normally main GDP source for countries’ export and in-country markets, will increase commodity prices but decrease income, shifting people towards poverty and food insecurity. Gender disparities make these adverse climate-related changes harsh on women and girls. Food aid is a solution to acute hunger but it will not replace the long-term actions needed to build up the resilience of communities for climate change. The actions include training of crop resistant variants, natural disaster preparedness and recovery, post-harvest and disease/pest information and other measures needed to insure the subsistence production for poor families. Women are essential part of these actions.

Numbers of natural disaster events have been witnessed to rise in the past decades (UNEP/GRID Arendal). Sudden onset disasters like hurricanes, intense rains causing landslides, flash floods and earthquakes, shift already existing short-term acute seasonal food insecurity due to e.g. harsh drought period or degradation of land resources, to long-term food insecurity and hunger. Women, who are responsible for the household resource management, multitask after disasters. They take care of their livestock and other livelihood assets that have survived the disaster, tend the children and elderly and provide the food and water needed. In many disaster areas, water and firewood resources are found long-distances away from home, and the distance walked, add the vulnerability status due to possible killings and sexual violence against women and girls. Women and children constitute up to 70-80% of those needing assistance in emergency situations due to their high risk of vulnerability. Mobility restrictions and other cultural behavior norms increase the direct vulnerability of women and girls in natural disasters. Community-based disaster risk and natural resource management with equal rights to land and natural resources needs to be enhanced so that it includes women’s traditional knowledge through equal participation to decision-making, training and education activities.

The risk for water-born diseases like malaria, dengue fever and cholera increases in post-disaster setting. Freshwater is limited and in many cases, animal faecals and urine is mixed in limited water sources, creating possibilities for zoonotical and bacterial diseases. The health status of women and children (boys and girls) deteriorates as they are the ones close for long-periods in the high-risk water areas. With decreasing health status of mother and longer distances walked to gather water, malnutrition hits easily. When mother’s health status deteriorates, soon children’s malnutrition status follow, making them more susceptible to infectious diseases. International Food Policy Institute predicts that by 2050 climate change will increase number of malnourished children up to 52 million in Africa.

Women of the developing countries will have more hard times ahead if agriculture and natural resources management is not adapted including the women’s knowledge and participation in all levels of decision-making and planning. We are facing a situation where gender-sensitive strategies and actions need to be put in action both in national level as well as on international level. The commitment will of nations will be seen in couple of weeks in Copenhagen UNFCCC COP-15 meeting. The resilience of communities to adverse weather events by natural disaster preparedness and recovery with the needed actions to ensure that world’s hunger status will not be climbing upward but downward, has to be ensured. States commitment for the Right to Food according to Resolution 2001/25 of the UN Commission on Human Rights and its implication under the Hyogo Framework cannot be put aside, this including the statement for gender: “A gender sensitive perspective should be integrated into all disaster risk management policies, plans and decision-making processes, including those related to risk assessment, early warning, information management, and education and training.”