A Care Approach to Food and Climate Justice in Southern Africa

The document is a popular education toolkit designed to help Southern African activists connect lived experiences of working-class women to structural inequalities in food and climate systems. It argues that care work—primarily unpaid labour performed by women—is the invisible foundation of food provision and community survival, yet is ignored by dominant neoliberal policies. The toolkit guides users through six activities to analyze social reproduction, the power dynamics of food systems, the gendered impacts of climate change, and the development of care-centred alternatives and advocacy strategies.

• Care work and social reproduction are essential for sustaining families, communities, and the economy, but remain structurally undervalued and invisible in most economic and policy frameworks.
• Industrial agricultural models and market-based solutions often deepen inequality and ecological destruction by focusing on productivity and technology while ignoring the unpaid care labour that sustains households.
• Southern Africa is heating at nearly twice the global average, leading to more frequent extreme heat, droughts, floods, and cyclones that disproportionately affect those dependent on land and water.
• Climate change intensifies the 'triple burden' for women—unpaid care work, subsistence farming, and income-generating activities—by increasing the time and effort required to secure basic resources like water and food.
• Women's vulnerability to climate shocks is exacerbated by unequal access to land and resources; they often own and control less than one-third of the land despite producing most of the region's food.
• A 'care approach' to food systems prioritises human needs and ecological well-being over profit, promoting agroecology and the right to food.
• The '5Rs' framework—Recognise, Reward, Represent, Reduce, and Redistribute—is proposed as a feminist strategy to transform food systems and strengthen climate resilience.
• Effective advocacy for care and food justice requires clear goals, an understanding of decision-making power, the building of alliances, and the centering of voices from the most affected communities.

APA

Yeni'], [. (n.d.). A Care Approach to Food and Climate Justice in Southern Africa. Institute for Economic Justice. https://iej.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IEJ-Food-Climate-and-Care-Toolkit.pdf

Chicago

Yeni'], ['Stha. A Care Approach to Food and Climate Justice in Southern Africa. Institute for Economic Justice, n.d. https://iej.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IEJ-Food-Climate-and-Care-Toolkit.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Yeni'] |first1=['Stha |title=A Care Approach to Food and Climate Justice in Southern Africa |publisher=Institute for Economic Justice |url=https://iej.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IEJ-Food-Climate-and-Care-Toolkit.pdf |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{yenindcare, author = {Yeni'], ['Stha}, title = {{A Care Approach to Food and Climate Justice in Southern Africa}}, institution = {Institute for Economic Justice}, url = {https://iej.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IEJ-Food-Climate-and-Care-Toolkit.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }