Thato Gabaitse confronts the heat on women in a warming planet

Thato Gabaitse, a climate activist, posing for a picture, during the COP29 Climate Conference in Baku, Azerbaijan, November 18, 2024. Photo: Seth Onyango, bird story agency

"Girl's girl", Thato Gabaitse explores the overlaps of gender violence and climate change, hoping to turn the climate crisis into an opportunity for women.

Seth Onyango, bird story agency

Thato Gabaitse takes a sip of her coffee, her first real pause after hours of shuttling between meetings. COP29 is a whirlwind of negotiations and high-stakes diplomacy, but Gabaitse’s mission cuts through the noise.

“I’m here as a feminist to hold the line...I am a girl's girl,” she declares, her sheer resolve etched on her face.

As a climate justice advocate from Botswana, Gabaitse is no stranger to challenging entrenched systems. Her mission is to highlight how the twin crises of climate change and gender inequality are deeply intertwined and demand urgent, equitable solutions.

However, her journey into the climate space has hardly been linear — it was forged in the fires of advocacy against gender-based violence.

"It all started with a group of women in Botswana standing up and saying, ‘Let’s take this to the streets,’” she recounted.

These early days of activism focused on addressing the rampant but often undocumented violence plaguing communities, especially in rural areas.

Gabaitse and her peers lobbied parliament, rallied for justice, and amplified the voices of survivors. But as her work took her deeper into Botswana’s communities, another crisis came into sharp focus: climate change.

“In Botswana, most communities depend on subsistence farming,” she explained. “But with extreme and extended droughts, families are struggling to survive.”

Gabaitse began to see how the effects of climate change exacerbated existing gender inequalities.

Women, already burdened with care roles, were now walking longer distances for water and struggling to feed their families as crops withered under an unrelenting sun.

Yet, the climate solutions Gabaitse encountered often failed to account for these realities.

“There’s so much misinformation and misalignment,” she noted. “Programs meant to help people don’t reach the communities that need them most.”

The gaps — between policy and reality, between rhetoric and impact — is where Gabaitse increasingly chose to work. Through her organisation, Breathe the World Botswana, she now helps young climate advocates navigate the labyrinth of international climate policies and funds.

“In Africa, we’re always playing catch-up,” she observed. “If young people don’t understand the technical language of negotiations, they can’t align their projects to make the impact that’s needed.”

Her advocacy doesn’t stop at translation. She’s calling for nothing less than a systemic overhaul of how climate finance is distributed.

“Africa needs the money,” she said bluntly. “We need it in grants, not loans.”

Her argument is clear: loans perpetuate a cycle of dependency and debt, forcing governments to divert funds from essential services like agriculture, water, and health.

“Moving money from one pot to another doesn’t solve the problem—it makes it worse.”

For Gabaitse, true progress requires an end to what she described as “a cycle of neo-colonialism.”

She has pushed for the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty to complement the Paris Agreement, ensuring that the Global South receives both the technical and financial support needed to transition away from fossil fuels.

For her, this isn’t just about meeting emissions targets, it’s about justice.

“Climate change is hitting the most vulnerable communities the hardest,” she said. “The money must go directly to the people who need it most.”

The narrative around women's role in communities is also something that she said needs to change.

“Women are not just victims of climate change—they’re at the forefront of finding solutions,” she asserted.

In many communities, women organise themselves, creating grassroots strategies to adapt to climate impacts. Yet they remain underrepresented at decision-making tables.

“If we don’t have women there, we’ll never act at the scale and speed that’s needed.”

Her work in gender equity has also evolved.

“It’s no longer just about women empowerment,” she said. “It’s about gender equity—representing all marginalized groups, including men who are struggling, and addressing mental health issues that often go unspoken.”

The shift reflects the complexity of the challenges she’s tackling. The stakes are high, and the resources are limited.

“There’s so little of us and so much to do,” she admitted, before hurrying on to her next meeting.

At COP29, Gabaitse has called for unity among African stakeholders — civil society, negotiators, and governments — to push for a common agenda.

“Right now, we’re all speaking different languages. One is technical, the other is more of demands. But we want the same thing.”

She said she envisions a future where these groups come together to form a cohesive strategy, amplifying Africa’s voice on the global stage.

“We have the power to get what we want... We just need to move in an integrated way.”

For Gabaitse, hope is a driving force. Despite the overwhelming challenges, she’s committed to the fight — for gender equity, for climate justice, for a future where the wounds of inequality and environmental destruction are healed.

“Let’s keep on pushing,” she said, her voice unwavering. “We’re rooting for our leaders, and we’re watching. We want an equitable, just transition—not just words, but action.”

In her words and work, Gabaitse is the face of a resilience and resolve that the fight against climate change seems to demand. As she continues to navigate the intersections of gender violence and environmental crisis, she offers a powerful reminder: the struggle for justice, whether social or environmental, is ultimately the same fight — and it’s always one worth waging.

bird story agency