Water and Gender Equality

Dr. Chinmoy Kumar Sarma

A statement released by the Director-General of UNESCO“Ensuring women’s participation in water management and governance is a key driver for progress and sustainable development. We must step up efforts to safeguard women and girls’ access to water.

This is not only a basic right: when women have equal access to water, everyone benefits” indicates the necessity of transforming water management and governing system from gender-blind to one that is gender-responsive, ensuring women’s leadership, equal rights, and representation at all levels.

Every year, World Water Day is celebrated on 22^nd March worldwide and the theme of the event for the year 2026 is “Water and gender” with the slogan “Where water flows, equality grows”. Water is earth’s most abundant compound and despite that fact, water scarcity affects millions of people every year, globally.

The crisis has especially worsened in the recent years due to climate change which results in drying out of reservoirs in several regions, ground water depletion, lack of proper infrastructure to conserve water and unchecked water pollution. The global water crisis affects everyone, but not equally. Where people lack the rights to safely managed water, sanitation and hygiene, inequalities flourish, with women and girls carry a disproportionate burden of the global water crisis, which impacts their safety, health, and economic opportunities.

In most of the cases, women and girls are left out in decision-making, leadership, funding and representation in the system which governs water use. Access to water and sanitation are human rights. Where females are unable to enjoy those rights, their health is profoundly affected, curtailing their educational and economic opportunities, and denying them their full role in society.Globally, 26% of women and girls, nearly 1.1 billion lack access to safely managed drinking water. (UNICEF calculation based on World Population Prospects 2024).In many countries, women and girls usually have the responsibility of fetching water; often, they walk long distance to fetch water which is physically demanding, time-consuming, and puts them at risk of violence.

When water is far away, girls are often pulled out of school and women cannot engage in income-generating activities, reinforcing gender inequality. As per report, 1.8 billion People still do not have drinking water on-premises and in two out of three households, women are primarily responsible for water collection. (WHO /UNICEF, 2023).In 53 countries, where data exists, women and girls spend 250 million hours per day on water collection, over three times more than men and boys. (UN Women, 2024).

Long journeys, often more than once a day, can leave women and girls vulnerable to attack and often precludes them from going to school or doing some paid works. Sometimes, health issues are also associated with carrying heavy water containers every day, especially in pregnant women and new mothers.Women and girls have specific hygiene needs. Inadequate water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) services disproportionately impact women’s health, particularly during menstruation, pregnancy, and childbirth.

Lack of proper sanitation, especially the absence of private toilets, is another factor that poses specific health and safety risks to women and girls. Going to toilet outside or in sharing facilities with men and boys puts women and girls at higher risk of abuse and assault. A clean, gender-segregated space which is functional with access to sanitary products and disposal systems for women and girls is needed to manage menstrual hygiene and pregnancy.Worldwide, only 2 out of 5 schools (39%) provide menstrual health education. (WHO/UNICEF,2024).

Every year, one million deaths are associated with unclean births. Infections account for 26% of neonatal deaths and 11% of maternal mortality. (WHO/UNICEF,2019).It’s anirony that women often act as the primary providers and managers of water, yet they are frequently excluded from the governance and ownership of the infrastructure.Worldwide, women make up less than 17 per cent of the total workforce in the water sector. Women remain underrepresented in water management and decision-making roles, holding fewer than 20% of water-related jobs in many regions.

Fewer than 50 countries have laws or policies that specifically mention women’s participation in rural sanitation or water resources management. (UN-Water, 2021).Up to 2023, about 15% of countries had no mechanisms to ensure effective participation of women and parity in decision-making and technical roles in water resources management. (UNEP-DHI, GWP, UN Women, 2025).These gender disparities not only have a negative impact on the achievement of gender equality (SDG 5), but also hinder progress on other Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the 2030 Agenda such as poverty reduction and food security, health and education, peace and justice etc.

Water and gender equality requires transforming the system from gender-blind to one that is gender-responsive, ensuring women’s leadership, equal rights, and representation at all levels. Key actions include collection of sex-disaggregated data to identify how water issues affect women differently and to guide effective policy, investing in women-led water solutions and integrating gender equality into all water policies and climate adaptation strategies.

Female safety and dignity must be of paramount importance in WASH service design. There are needs to design water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) services that consider the specific needs of women and girls, including safety, dignity, and menstrual hygiene management to reduce health risks and school absenteeism.Rectifying gender imbalances in WASH governance and management, at all levels, will ensure the suitability of services and raise the status of women in society.

Empowering and elevating the role of women as providers and managers of water at the household and community levels will be critical for ensuring gender equality in water use and sanitation.

We need a transformative, rights-based approach to solving the water crisis, where women’s voices and agency are fully recognized. Embedding gender equity into policy at all levels will be crucial for achieving water and sanitation for all, which in turn will help in achieving other SDG agenda, particularly poverty reduction, health, education, and work.

Dr. Chinmoy Kumar Sarma, Dept. of Agronomy, Assam Agricultural University, Jorhat, Mobile: 9957130225

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