Climate change is one of the most pressing issue of our time, and it requires a kind of long-term decision making and planning that often seems beyond those officials that govern our society.  A recent study from the University of Colorado Boulder found a relatively simple way to improve environmental decision making.

In a study of several hundred forest users across three countries, they found that when women were more involved in conservation decisions, the group ended up taking more sustainable choices.

“When policymakers think about what to do to increase conservation around the world, gender quotas don’t even come up as a viable policy instrument,” the authors say. “This study suggests they should.”

The study builds upon previous work that has shown that women often have a greater affinity for the environment, and therefore support measures to conserve it.  In many countries women remain underrepresented in decision making groups however, and so they are often unable to put their preferences into action.

Diverse decision makers

The team traveled to over 30 villages in Indonesia, Tanzania and Peru, whereby a simulation game was played that involved participants being split into teams of eight and tasked with making key decisions about the management of a shared forest.  The researchers mandated that half of the team had gender quotas that required them to be split half and half between men and women, whilst the other groups had no such requirements.

To begin with, teams had to anonymously select the trees they would cut down, with a 5 token payment received for each tree.  They were then told that an external organization would pay them 160 tokens if they didn’t cut down any trees.

“We found that the groups with the gender quota reduced their harvesting rate far more when the incentive was introduced and also distributed the payments for conserving more equally,” the authors explain.

Interestingly, this was especially so when financial incentives came into play.  When no money was on the table, the groups typically behaved in the same way as each other, but as soon as money was introduced, those with the female quota reduced harvesting by 51%, versus just 39% for the control group.

“It appears that it is not the gender quota by itself that is making a difference, but rather the combination with the conservation incentive,” the authors explain. “Maybe women have stronger environmental preferences but having a seat at the table and a payment for foregoing the immediate benefits of cutting down trees empowers them to act.”

Community action

The research is interesting as many of the conservation projects around the world are filtered through local community groups, who own and manage many of the threatened forestry that the world is striving to protect.  Alas, these groups are nearly exclusively male.

A number of government initiatives exist in these countries to promote greater gender diversity in key decision making groups, with countries like Argentina and India legislating for 30% of key seats to be held by women, and this research shows that such actions are crucial if conservation is to succeed.

“The big takeaway here is that when it comes to environmental conservation, the presence of women matters,” the authors conclude.