Breaking Barriers: Gender Equality in Business for Nature

WHAT

This event is one of the official side events at the UN Responsible Business and Human Rights Forum Asia-Pacific 2025. It focuses on the urgent need to integrate gender justice into business operations impacting biodiversity and the environment. It will explore how environmental degradation and gender injustice are deeply linked, advocating for women’s empowerment alongside climate action. The session aims to promote accountability for environmental and gender-related harms and advance practical proposals to embed gender justice in responsible business conduct and legal frameworks, particularly by amplifying the voices of Indigenous and rural women.

WHEN

Tuesday, 16 September 2025, from 11.30 am to 12.00 noon ICT. Please check your timezone here.

WHERE

Watch on Zoom.

WHO

• Surya Deva, Special Rapporteur on the right to development
• Romchat Wachirarattanakornkul, Climate Change & Environment Regional Focal Point at UN Human Rights – Asia
• June Rubis, Co-Founder Building Intiatives in Indigenous Heritage, Honorary Member of the ICCA Consortium and Member of the Steering Committee of the Multilateral Mechanism on DSI, ICCA Consortium
• Mrinalini Rai, Founder and Director, Women4Biodiversity – Moderator

WHY

• To highlight the integration of gender justice into business operations that affect biodiversity, land, and the environment, particularly in biodiversity-rich regions of Asia and the Pacific.
• To emphasize the environmental degradation and gender injustice are deeply connected and to advocate for the fight against climate change and biodiversity loss to be combined with women’s social, economic, and political empowerment.
• To explore how companies and states can move beyond policy commitments to address structural discrimination and ensure accountability for environmental and gender-related harms, using an intersectional lens.
• To amplify the voices of women, especially from Indigenous and rural communities, to advance practical proposals to embed gender justice into responsible business conduct, legal frameworks, and environmental governance.