In it together: advancing women’s rights through the extractive industries transparency movement

It is well documented that extractive projects can have dire gender consequences given that women usually have the most to lose (in terms of loss of land or livelihoods, increase in gender-based violence etc.) and the least to gain from the process of extraction in the communities where they occur and in the
country as a whole. Gender issues (in terms of socially constructed roles and expectations) also affect and involve men as they seek high-risk jobs in extractive project sites, often with poor social protection and away from traditional social safety-nets. Even so, there is often a gender imbalance in processes of
decision-making linked to how extractive resources are managed, and in international mechanisms such as the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) where women are often underrepresented. Until recently, the EI oversight sector has also paid little attention to gender issues to date.

This research component is part of a two-year gender pilot project (2018-2019) where the international civil society coalition Publish What You Pay (PWYP) will seek to better understand and apply a gender perspective to its work and its interactions with the multi-stakeholder groups (MSGs) in EITI implementing  countries in West Africa.