It won’t matter how advanced technology is if the people who need it most can’t access it

We live in a world with a startling disconnect between rapidly developing technology and the women and girls it is leaving behind, especially in Africa. As we celebrate International Women’s Day under the “DigitAll: innovation and technology for gender equality” theme, it’s time to recognize this, refocus, and urgently act on it to ensure digital advancements and technology serve women and girls and do not widen gender gaps even further.

Progress towards gender equality is stalling in most of the developing world, including in Africa. According to the most recent gender equality index for the Sustainable Development Goals, progress towards gender equality in sub-Saharan Africa has stagnated for at least the past two years, a situation made worse by the COVID-19 pandemic.

However, looking beyond the impact of the pandemic, globally and in Africa, policymakers continue to overlook a crucial pillar to bridging gender inequality today – providing women with equitable access to digital technologies.

In an increasingly digitally driven world, women in Africa are being left behind in the digital evolution. In Africa, women only make up 30% of the jobs in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Women are also less likely than men to access and use a mobile phone, smartphone, or go online. The digital divide has become the new face of gender inequality.

Digital technologies are rapidly transforming all spheres of our lives – work, education, relationships, economies, industries, and governments. Advancements in digital technology offer immense opportunities to address development and humanitarian challenges in Africa. Technology is a crucial driver of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR), with the unprecedented growth of Information Communication Technologies (ICT) intersecting our daily lives. It has and continues to create a range of opportunities for innovation. For example, the African Continental Free Trade Agreement, with the support of technology, will enable women to trade beyond borders and significantly change the face of trade in Africa.

Unfortunately, these opportunities also present a risk of perpetuating existing patterns of gender inequality. Growing inequalities are becoming increasingly evident in the context of digital skills and access to technologies, with women being left behind and excluded from the digital transformation, its benefits, and potential employment as a result of the digital gender divide. Women and girls are left out of digital transformation, its benefits, and potential employment. Multiple crises including COVID-19, conflicts, the growing cost of living, and climate change, have magnified the unequal pace of digital transformation within and across countries. Digital technologies are also creating unprecedented threats to the wellbeing of women and girls. Online spaces provide new venues for violence against women, offering perpetrators increased anonymity and impunity. Women in the public eye are targeted more than men, impacting their lives, and limiting their participation in public life.

It is hard to overstate just how much overlooking digital access for women in Africa is limiting the continent’s progress. Women in Africa remain underrepresented in the digital realm, despite data from UN Women showing that excluding women from the digital world has reduced the GDP of low- and middle-income countries by $1 trillion over the past decade. A number that could grow to $1.5 trillion by 2025.

We urge African leaders, governments, and the private sector, to take the lead in fostering women’s access to technology, promote and celebrate women in tech, and support the achievement of their full political, social, and economic participation.

This International Women’s Day presents a great opportunity to remind policy makers of the importance of addressing the gender gaps in technology and innovation in a way that transforms social norms and empowers women and girls. The issues of literacy (including, digital literacy); access (to the internet, gadgets, and technology); and safety (safety from online violence) are critical to the technology and innovation conversation

To access any digital space, one needs both functional and digital literacy. Support for women and girls in technology and innovation should be available along the entire pipeline – from primary school to employment. We urge African governments to embed digital capacity in educational curriculums; prioritize digital training of women and girls in government policies and programs to equip women with functional digital literacy and promote the use of digital technologies to start and grow businesses.

Even when a woman is trained, if she has no access to the internet or devices, her participation in digital space is limited. According to the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), in Africa, women account for only 24% of the population using the internet, while men account for 35% of users. In rural areas, where internet penetration rate is lowest, only 15% of the population access the internet, which means that rural women access even less. Using a mobile phone is hampered by affordability, lack of electricity, patriarchal norms, and minimal access to or knowledge of relevant content. This must be addressed, as research indicates that mobile money accounts have become indispensable instruments that provide women greater financial autonomy than cash payments. In Uganda, for instance, women who received digital microfinance loans earned 15 percent more than those who received cash loans. So, when money is deposited into a woman’s mobile account, it is more difficult for others to claim it as their own.

We urge African governments and the private sector to build infrastructure and regulate markets to broaden access, affordability, and use of technology by women and girls, especially in remote rural areas, migratory routes and in refugee camps. An additional barrier women face towards digital access is online violence.

A survey of women journalists from 125 countries found that 73% of respondents had suffered online violence in the course of their work, 30% reporting that they self-censored in response. Technology often aggravates the level of violence perpetrated by individuals, organized groups or institutions that have the objective of controlling, harming, silencing or discrediting women. We call on governments to ensure that the digital space is safe for women and girls, design of digital protection laws should factor online gender-based violence laws and training of users, innovators, security, and law agencies. We call on individuals to be respectful in the digital space.

In addition, African leaders must ensure programs are available to change the current narrative portraying women and girls as passive users. We need to recognize and celebrate women championing technology and promote women and girls’ leadership in technology. The “African Girls Can CODE” initiative, designed by UN Women, the African Union Commission and ITU to equip young girls with digital literacy, coding, and personal development skills, is one example of such initiative. Girls from 34 African countries are trained as programmers, creators, and designers, placing them on-track to take up education and careers in ICT and coding allowing them to control and influence the digital landscape as they see fit. Sex-disaggregated data must be collected and used to support gender-responsive innovation, determine the extent of the gender gap and monitor progress in bridging it.

The Action Coalition on Technology and Innovation, launched as part of the Generation Equality Forum, is key to driving momentum and commitments to advance gender equality through technology and innovation, and to cementing alliances between Governments, the private sector, civil society, and the UN System to achieve this ambition. The Government of Rwanda is one of the Action Coalition leaders here in Africa.

Conversations on artificial intelligence (AI) are featuring heavily in global health discourse not least because of the promised transformative nature of such technologies. It is crucial that these discussions do not lose sight of the core objective, which is to ensure that technology infrastructure, institutions, and systems and regulations are designed with women and people from the Global South in mind. The transformative nature of technology is meaningless if it is inaccessible to those who need it the most.

UN Women and the Gates Foundation have prioritized innovation, technology, and gender data as key drivers of change to achieve gender equality and the SDGs. We believe that inclusive technology and digital education is crucial for a sustainable future on the African continent. Each of us can play a role: governments, the private sector, and individuals. Join us in making innovation and technology work for digital gender equality.

Dr Maxime Houinato is the UN Women Regional Director for East and Southern Africa and Rachel Toku-Appiah is the director, Program Advocacy and Communications, Africa at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation