South African female participation at the 2022 Women Energize Women conference

On May 12, 2022 the 1^st “Women Energize Women” conference took place in Munich within the context of the Smarter E Europe. More than 250 energy experts from over 50 countries participated in discussion rounds, workshops and other formats on urgent energy and gender issues – looking at them from a female perspective.

The energy sector is still mistakenly considered to be a male domain. This ignores the impressive contributions that women around the globe make as drivers of innovation and technical experts. Thus, the conference as the first of its kind to provide a stage exclusively for female energy experts, spotlighted the role of women in shaping the global energy transition.

The South African-German Energy Partnership supported the Women Energize Women conference and its accompanying event called Media Fellowship by providing four women delegates as follows:

Representative from the Women in Electricity (WIE) initiative of the Association of Municipal Electricity Utilities (AMEU) who attended the conference as a speaker.
Representative from the Department of Mineral Resources and Energy (DMRE) who is also a mentee of the Global Women Network (GWNET) programme as a delegate.
Representative from the South African Wind Energy Association who is also a mentee of the GWNET programme as a delegate.
The fourth woman was an independent journalist who writes articles on climate change and just transition who joined the Media Fellowship programme side event and also attended the conference.

The local participants found all sessions to be valuable and insightful with a particular mention of the women’s network session which was very informative in so far as learning from other networks ways around dealing with funding models, fund-raising, communication strategy and how to increase membership of the women network.

The event marks a highlight of the “Women Energize Women” communication campaign that GIZ is implementing in collaboration with German Renewable Energy Federation (BEE) and on behalf of the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK) within the framework of the Bilateral Energy Partnerships. By offering interactive events, inspiring role models and knowledge exchange it aims to empower, motivate, inform, inspire and connect women in the energy sector from across the world.

Contact

Henrik Hartmann

Sandiswa Tshaka

Karabo Masekwameng

South African female participation at the 2022 Women Energize Women conference