Gender-mainstreaming, governance, and the environment: an analysis of forest loss

ABSTRACT Gender mainstreaming is the push in international governance and development to use women’s empowerment, inclusion and labor to be more inclusive and help solve development issues. Research has found that when women are involved in projects, environmental outcomes are more likely to succeed. Over the past 30 years, environmental bilateral development aid has been increasing. Extant research has theorized the relationship between environmental aid, women’s empowerment and forest loss. However, results have been mixed, with some finding that female-focused environmental aid reduces forest loss, while others find that it increases forest loss. To add to this debate, we argue that bilateral aid may be moderated by quality of the receiving nation’s governance. Using high-quality satellite forest loss data, we use ordinary least-squares regression with robust standard errors for a sample of 85 low- and middle-income nations from 2000 to assess if nations with high levels of governance facilitate bilateral aid effectiveness that focuses simultaneously on gender equality and environmental protection. We find that in nations with high levels of governance, bilateral environmental gender aid is significantly associated with reduced levels of forest loss.