Europe - Regional perspectives.

 In Europe, water is deeply embedded in the social, economic and institutional fabric of daily life. Safe, reliable and affordable access to water underpins human well-being and sustainable development. Significant infrastructure advances have provided many people in Europe with household water and sanitation access. However, gender disparities persist, particularly in decision-making, labour responsibilities, climate risk exposure and recognition in governance and knowledge systems.

European water governance has developed under frameworks such as the European Union Water Framework Directive and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030. However, gender equality remains under-integrated in many national- and basin-level water strategies. Formal representation alone has not yielded substantive influence for women, particularly those from rural areas or minority backgrounds. Intersectional factors further shape this limited influence. For example, socio-economic status, ethnicity, age, disability, marital status and social stigma can affect women’s opportunities to participate meaningfully in water governance and to access leadership roles. Women from marginalized ethnic groups or married women with familial responsibilities often face multiple obstacles that may limit their inclusion in decision-making processes. To achieve effective participation, policy approaches need to move beyond token representation and adopt intersectional strategies that recognize diverse experiences and enable women to hold substantive decision-making and leadership positions. Analyses have demonstrated that socio-economic and demographic factors can compound vulnerabilities, highlighting the critical importance of policies that address gender and the intersecting axes of inequality in water governance. Structural inequalities may be intensified in contexts of displacement and migration, where access to water and sanitation becomes even more precarious. In reception centres on the Greek islands, for example, inadequate gender-sensitive WASH facilities have heightened health risks and increased exposure to gender-based violence towards women and girls. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees reported that bathrooms and latrines are considered unsafe after dark, and some women avoid showers for months due to fear of assault. A review of participatory water initiatives in Central and Eastern Europe found that while multistakeholder councils exist, the perspectives of women and marginalized groups have rarely been reflected in final decisions . Water-related climate hazards – such as droughts, floods and contamination – can affect everyone, but risk perception and vulnerability may differ by gender. Europe-wide surveys indicate women report higher concern and willingness to engage in water conservation behaviours than men. This is often linked to caregiving responsibilities and risk awareness 

A significant impediment to gender-responsive water governance is the dominance of decisionmaking processes and technical practices that may be shaped mainly by men and which often overlook women’s local and experiential knowledge. In many European countries, engineering and hydrology departments – which shape water planning and evaluation – remain heavily male dominated. Women’s situated knowledge, such as local observations of aquifer depletion or sanitation needs, has often lacked institutional legitimacy. This epistemic hierarchy may be reinforced in climate adaptation planning, where quantitative models often exclude social and cultural variables. Pilot initiatives in Hungary and Slovakia have shown that including women in participatory water monitoring can enhance the quality and relevance of local planning, but these approaches remain limited and underfunded. Subregional disparities may compound these gaps. Eastern and Southern Europe have experienced intensified drought cycles, with significant implications for smallholder agriculture. However, water adaptation initiatives often reinforce gender disparities. In the Mediterranean region, studies have shown that water-saving irrigation programmes disproportionately benefited male-led commercial farms, whereas women – often engaged in unpaid labour or small-scale farming – were excluded from consultation and financing mechanisms. This reflects a broader trend in European rural policy, where eligibility for subsidies is frequently tied to land titles and formal membership in WUAs that are often male dominated. Water is central to the often-invisible domain of care and domestic work, which is frequently performed by women across Europe. In addition, in countries such as Spain and Türkiye, women may be significantly more involved than men in household water-saving practices, recycling and adaptation to supply constraints. However, water policy and infrastructure design rarely account for this labour. Tariff systems and service quality reviews have typically treated households as neutral units, overlooking intra-household dynamics and the gendered costs of water collection, hygiene management and sanitation maintenance. In rural Romania and parts of the Western Balkans, inadequate infrastructure has placed a disproportionate physical and emotional burden on women – particularly older women and those in households headed by women. The result is an enduring misalignment between public investment logic and the realities of how water is managed and valued in everyday life. 

Moving beyond structural gaps, inclusive water governance requires approaches that recognize gendered inequalities while actively creating opportunities for women’s participation and leadership. Across Europe, emerging practices demonstrate how integrating gender perspectives into water management can strengthen resilience and equity. For instance, in Albania, internationally supported watershed management projects have provided women with meaningful opportunities in monitoring, training and reforestation leadership. This has improved ecosystem resilience and gender equality, showing how integrated approaches can redress historical exclusions. Water-related investments in Europe seldom apply gender-responsive budgeting or monitoring frameworks. As a result, projects may unintentionally widen inequalities by ignoring factors such as who benefits and who bears the costs. For instance, water infrastructure upgrades that increase household tariffs without progressive affordability measures may disproportionately affect female-headed and low-income households. Austria presents a progressive example, where gender-responsive budgeting tools have been used in municipal water infrastructure planning. Disaggregated data can help policymakers identify and correct gender-based disparities in access, safety and public hygiene infrastructure – particularly benefiting older women and single-parent households. Wider change may be achieved through transforming the institutional culture of water organizations and investing in gender-responsive human resources systems. Tools like the Gender Responsive Assessment Scale – developed by WHO to evaluate gender integration in policies – and Austria’s municipal budgeting reforms offer models for integrating gender equality into water finance, ensuring social and economic returns are achieved. However, these tools require political commitment, capacity-building and institutional incentives to be scaled across countries and sectors. Inclusive and adaptive water strategies may be achieved by recognizing the validity of multiple knowledge systems, including experiential and traditional knowledge held by women. In this regard, the Equitable Access Score-card 2.0 provides a practical self-assessment tool developed under the Protocol on Water and Health. Applied in 15 countries, including recent assessments in Albania (from October 2023 to June 2024), Georgia (from December 2024 to September 2025) and Montenegro (from January to July 2023), it has helped governments collect sex-disaggregated data, identify gender-based inequalities in WASH and inform policy actions, such as improved school sanitation and menstrual hygiene initiatives. These examples demonstrate how structured monitoring instruments can catalyze policy reforms and gender-responsive actions in the water sector, offering practical guidance for other countries seeking to strengthen equality in WASH services

Although Europe has achieved near-universal coverage in access to water supply and sanitation, gender-based disparities remain embedded in multiple dimensions of the water sector. Women are still under-represented in technical, managerial and policymaking roles in the water sector, despite notable progress in gender equality across European institutions. Structural barriers such as lack of mentorship, gendered job expectations and work–life imbalance can contribute to women’s attrition and limited upward mobility. 

Such gender inequalities are not simply a result of technical gaps but rather stem from deep-rooted institutional and sociocultural blind spots in how water systems are conceptualized, governed and financed. The role of women in water-related labour – especially in domestic and caregiving contexts – continues to be undervalued and largely invisible in water planning and budgeting. Ensuring meaningful women’s participation in decision-making mechanisms may be achieved through research and policymaking processes viewing women as active subjects. A shift in how water governance integrates gender analysis may contribute to addressing these obstacles. Institutions could consistently collect and apply sex-disaggregated data in the design, implementation and monitoring of water policies. Valuing unpaid care and domestic labour within water service delivery systems and pricing frameworks could help to recognize the full economic contribution of women to water management. Women’s experiential and place-based knowledge could be treated as a critical input in water decisionmaking – particularly in climate adaptation planning and disaster risk management. By reflecting the intersectional realities of gender, age, ethnicity and economic status – which together determine levels of vulnerability to water-related hazards – risk assessments could aid inclusivity. The application of gender-responsive budgeting tools at the national and European levels may encourage water investments to promote technical efficiency, social equality and long-term sustainability. Ultimately, water governance in Europe needs to evolve beyond its technocratic confines to reflect the lived realities of all those who depend on water – not only to advance gender equality, but also to strengthen resilience and ensure a truly sustainable future for people and ecosystems alike