Who Bears the Burden? Gender and the Energy Transition in Africa
Grace, a mother of four in rural Zambia, wakes before dawn to trek miles for firewood. She balances heavy bundles on her head, prepares meals over a smoky three-stone fire. Grace’s day is a story repeated by millions of women across Africa, one where energy poverty is written on the female body.
This is the stark reality of gender and the energy transition in Africa. As the world clamours for cobalt, lithium, and graphite from African soil to power electric vehicles and solar batteries, the women who carry the heaviest energy burdens are often left out of the conversation. The paradox is cruel: Africa’s minerals light up Europe’s cities and Asia’s factories, yet in Sub-Saharan Africa, more than 600 million people lack electricity, and nearly four in five households still rely on biomass for cooking (IEA, 2023). The majority of those affected are women.
The Gendered Costs of Energy Poverty
Energy poverty in Africa is not gender-neutral. It is deeply skewed against women and girls.
- Time Poverty: Women and girls spend an estimated 18 hours per week collecting firewood and water (World Bank, 2022). This is time that could otherwise be invested in education, income generation, or civic participation.
- Health Burdens: Indoor air pollution from biomass stoves is equivalent to smoking two packs of cigarettes a day. It causes 815,000 premature deaths annually across Sub-Saharan Africa, mostly women and children (IEA, 2023).
- Economic Exclusion: Because women shoulder unpaid care work, their participation in the formal energy workforce remains marginal, even as global energy transitions generate millions of green jobs.
A recent report on the crisis of energy poverty in Southern Africa highlights how load shedding, high tariffs, and weak grid infrastructure worsen gender inequalities. For women, the energy transition cannot come fast enough, but it must come with justice.
Women as Innovators, Not Just Victims
Despite the odds, women across Africa are seeding the future of clean energy.
- Kenya’s Norah Magero developed VacciBox, a portable solar-powered fridge for vaccines, helping save lives in remote communities.
- In Tanzania, women-led cooperatives managing solar mini-grids have quadrupled household incomes, increased school attendance, and boosted women’s decision-making power in community councils (Arxiv, 2024).
- Across the continent, 38% of Africa’s solar PV workforce is female, higher than the global average, according to the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA Renewable Energy and Jobs Review 2023).
These are not token stories; they are proof that when women are given tools, finance, and training, they turn transitions into transformations. Yet systemic barriers persist. Women-owned businesses receive less than 5% of clean energy investment in Africa (AfDB, 2023). Gender-responsive finance is still an afterthought rather than a default.
Policy Gaps Holding Women Back
Here lies the uncomfortable truth: most national energy transition strategies sideline gender.
- Nigeria’s Energy Transition Plan is heavy on finance and technology pathways but light on women’s access to clean cooking.
- South Africa’s Just Energy Transition Partnership has mobilised over $8.5 billion, but with little earmarked for women or grassroots communities.
- In SADC, governments tout the value addition of critical minerals as the path to industrialisation, but rarely discuss the women miners, processors, and informal traders who risk exclusion from new mineral hubs.
Without gender audits, budget allocations, and legal safeguards, these strategies risk replicating extractive, male-dominated economies in a greener disguise.
This is where regional collaboration becomes crucial. Individual countries cannot on their own manage value chains of cobalt, lithium, and nickel. A regional industrial policy is needed, one that pools resources and ensures women are not marginalised in cross-border trade and industrial hubs. See regional cooperation for Africa’s mineral trade and processing for deeper analysis.
From Burden to Opportunity: What Needs to Change
To transform gender and the energy transition in Africa, several steps are urgent:
- Mainstream Gender in Energy Plans: Gender audits and clear indicators must be built into national and regional transition frameworks.
- Finance Women Entrepreneurs: Donors and African banks should ringfence at least 30% of clean energy funds for women-led enterprises.
- Skills and Education: Green curricula in universities and vocational institutes should prioritise training women for engineering, installation, and management roles.
- Civil Society Mobilisation: Organisations must amplify women’s stories, monitor gender gaps, and pressure governments to deliver gender-responsive budgets.
These are not optional extras; they are the linchpins of a just transition.
Conclusion: Powering Women, Powering Africa
Africa’s minerals light up the world, but African women are still cooking over firewood. This contradiction cannot stand.
The upcoming Africa Climate Summit 2025 is a test of leadership. Leaders must go beyond declarations and adopt binding commitments for regional industrialisation and gender-responsive value addition. For the millions of women carrying the daily burden of energy poverty, this moment must not be squandered.
Civil society cannot afford silence. From community groups to continental coalitions, the message must be loud: the value addition of critical minerals in SADC is meaningless if women remain in the dark.
The future of gender and the energy transition in Africa will be measured not just in megawatts and minerals, but in whether women’s lives improve, their labour is recognised, and their voices shape policy. Because in the end, empowering women means powering Africa.
For more on the broader justice dimensions, see what a just energy transition means for Africa.
