Women's collective action and gender just transitions

The climate crisis is intensifying across the globe, with profound implications for workers in food supply chains. Food systems face a dual challenge: they are heavily impacted by climate change while contributing approximately 12% of global greenhouse gas emissions. This critical juncture demands a shift towards more sustainable practices. Yet, as the world transitions towards a low-carbon economy, it is vital that these transitions are just for the workers involved. Women workers play a significant role in keeping food systems running, but they remain significantly underrepresented in decisions about the future of their work, even as they face some of the greatest impacts from climate change and the measures introduced to address it.

This collaborative PhD between the Ethical Trading Initiative (ETI), Women Working Worldwide(WWW) and the Centre for Global Development (CGD) at Northumbria University explores how women's collective organising and social dialogue can promote gender just transitions in global food supply chains.

While there has been extensive research on just transitions in the energy sector and in the global North, far less attention has been paid to global South workers or the food sector specifically. This research seeks to bridge that gap by focusing on agricultural supply chains, beginning with women workers in the global South. Bringing together the expertise of each partner organisation, this project will develop a multi-scalar understanding of the challenges in achieving gender just transitions. By engaging with actors across global food supply chains, including women workers, companies in the global South, and UK food industry stakeholders, it employs an interdisciplinary and feminist approach to investigate how women's collective action can enhance their rights in the context of just transitions.

Funded by the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) through the Northern Bridge Consortium, this research will combine oral history interviews, archival research and participatory photography with women workers to situate their contemporary experiences within an understanding of past historical injustices. Through this approach, the research seeks to establish paths forward for women workers in the context of climate change, strengthen relationships along global food supply chains, and ensure just transitions are beneficial for all.

Research questions

1. How is organising by women workers in global food supply chains shaping gender just transitions?
2. What formal and informal spaces are women workers involved in, or excluded from, in relation to collective organising around just transitions?
3. How can organising by, and social dialogue with, women workers in tea supply chains contribute to more equitable just transitions that prioritise workers’ human rights?
4. What examples are there of current good practice within the UK food sector in ensuring a gender just transition, in line with the priorities of women working in their supply chains?
5. How can WWW archives and women workers’ oral histories be harnessed to support greater inclusion of women workers in social dialogue, and connect with longer histories of labour organising?

Blogs and research updates

This blog series will provide updates on the research project, highlighting progress, key focus areas, and valuable insights gained throughout the collaborative PhD journey.

1) Click the link below to read the first blog, introducing the project:

Blog edition #1 (November 2025):  Green, A. (2025). Project introduction: Women’s collective action and gender just transitions. Northumbria University. https://doi.org/10.25398/rd.northumbria.30676190 

About the PhD researcher

Aishath Green is a researcher working at the intersection of climate justice, gender equality and labour rights. Before starting her PhD at Northumbria University’s Centre for Global Development, she worked as a Research Associate at University College London on a UKRI-funded project examining how politics shapes global measurement frameworks for climate adaptation. With an academic background in History from the University of Edinburgh and Environment, Politics and Development from SOAS, Aishath brings an interdisciplinary and feminist perspective to questions of social and environmental justice. Having previously explored street traders’ right to the city, she is particularly interested in how women workers’ collective action can inform just climate transitions in global food systems. Aishath comes at this project from a knowledge of practice and looks forward to using creative and participatory methods to bridge research and policy through this collaboration.

To find out more, please contact Aishath Green (PhD researcher) or Prof Katy Jenkins (Principal Supervisor at Northumbria University).