DigitALL: Innovation and Technology for Gender Equality.

Written by: Chigozie Paul

- Women make up only 22 percent of artificial intelligence workers globally.

- A global analysis of 133 AI systems across industries found that 44.2 percent demonstrate gender bias.

- A survey of women journalists from 125 countries found that 73 percent had suffered online violence during their work. — Data Source (un.women)

Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are highlighted and identified as actions that, when taken, would balance and sustain social, economic, and environmental sustainability. One of these SDGs, SDG 5, is Gender equality.

Over the years, there has been an apparent Gender gap in the technology space and other developmental areas, for instance, education and other career sectors.

Depending on the development of the countries and communities, women are quickly side-lined by religious and cultural biases, societal stereotypes, poverty, lack of awareness, etc.

For instance, in some rural communities in Africa, it is believed that the place of a woman is in the background, which has birthed a reduction in the literacy rate of female children. It has also birthed the girl-bride tradition, where young girls are sold to older men in the form of marriage.

As the world continues to advance technologically and in other areas, it is essential to note that for the sake of sustainability and growth of the world’s economy, we need to fight together for gender equity. It is also important to note that Gender equity is not the same as equality.

While equality is a good start, we should aim for equity, and I’ll explain. While equality is the state of being equal, especially in status, rights, or opportunities, equity is the state of being fair and impartial. As it stands now, the scale is imbalanced, which means there is only a little that equal opportunities can do.

For instance, if we give two people, a fisherman and a teacher, the same fishing tools, only the fisherman would know what to do with the tools. They are equal opportunities but do not precisely address the issue. This is why to achieve a balanced world; we need to work twice as hard to ensure that we get to a point where equal opportunities make a difference.

There is a misconception that more opportunities for women mean lesser opportunities for men, but this is false. More opportunities for women at this time, balance an imbalanced scale.

If I had two cups on a table, one full and one empty, the solution is not leaving the empty cup so that the two cups are not half full but taking water from a tap or another water source to fill the other cup. Have we lost you? There are a plethora of opportunities. No party has to suffer in the fight for equity. There are enough opportunities to go around.

As we celebrate International Women’s Day 2023, there is no better time than now to brainstorm on how you can play your part in achieving a fair world for all. At Tech4Dev, we are playing our part by ensuring that women are provided with access to decent job opportunities in the future workplace and the necessary skills and support structure to enable women to start and scale technology-enabled businesses and deep-tech start-ups through the Women Techsters Initiative and other programs where we ensure a quota for women and girls.

So in our own little corners, let’s #embraceequity and create a truly equitable world.