Women and ICTs in Africa

According to this paper, published in the Southern African Gender and Media Diversity Journal, information and communication technologies (ICTs) are an effective instrument for increasing choices for women and for multifaceted empowerment. They are enabling mechanisms for achieving specific goals. In this case, ICTs can be mechanisms for expanding knowledge and access to information among different categories of women, especially rural women, and can enhance their abilities to negotiate for their resource share and participation. However, despite the revolutionary progress made in Africa in the ICT sector, ICT accessibility for women in Africa is still a big challenge.

According to the paper, ICTs refer to "a diverse set of technological tools and resources used to communicate, and to create, disseminate, store, and manage information". These technologies include computers, the internet, broadcasting technologies (radio and television), and telephony (fixed and mobile). In the last 20 years, there has been a revolution in the continent regarding ICTs and how people communicate. However, the majority of women in Africa still live in economic poverty, making access to ICTs a matter of hard choice. Due to financial constraints and limited economic power, most African women face the dilemma of choosing whether to spend their money on use of ICTs or on food for their families and other very basic needs of survival. The unequal power relations between men and women that contribute to differential access, participation, and treatment of men and women in the information society are, in most cases, overlooked in various interventions made over the years.

The author explains that ICTs can be instruments for empowering different categories of women with technological information and skills for political, economic, and social participation, and for supporting their achievement of sustainable food security and livelihood. ICTs are increasingly being used in democracy work to strengthen solidarity, increase communication among organisations and individual activists, share information quickly, and mobilise effectively. Projects launched by Google and Fahamu have provided internet and mobile phone service in remote areas of Africa, enabling towns to become more informed about events that affect and impact their lives. The UmNyango Project, launched by Fahamu, distributes mobile phones throughout rural communities in Africa so that men and women can report human rights violations on a regular basis. In Uganda, the Forum for Women in Democracy (FOWODE) uses information gathered by women parliamentarians from the internet to address their constituents on critical issues and to stimulate input on laws enacted by parliament. However, ICTs alone cannot bring about lasting change. They need to be coupled with responsive legislative and policy frameworks and changes in people's attitudes about the potential they have to transform their lives.

The paper argues that ICTs have the potential to help address issues facing women and provide opportunities to build the capacity and potential of women to improve their quality of life. However, according to the author, there is a need to understand how to harness these technologies to the benefit of women. The document outlines a number of key areas of possible action for governments, the African Union, and civil society:

Governments

• Use ICTs to help provide information to women so that they can make appropriate and informed decisions on matters that affect them, their families, and communities. For example, the government can increase awareness among women on how the legal system and parliaments function and how they can effectively engage in the decision making process through the use of ICTs.
• Invest in the use of ICTs for storage and easy retrieval of data and information in institutions that are responsible for processing land titles, trading licenses, birth and death, and other legal documents that affect women’s rights to own, control, and have access to development resources.
• Support the use of ICTs in education (formal and informal), particularly literacy programmes to build ICT skills among young and adult learners and increase awareness about the opportunities for development using ICTs.
• Support girls and women to take courses at higher education levels that are relevant for employment in the ICT sector.
• Formulate policies that encourage women to use ICTs within the household and in their businesses and also make ICTs affordable for women.
• Invest in ICTs for development and also allocate money from the national budget to build women's capacity to use ICTs in advancing themselves.
• Strengthen monitoring of implementation for policies and guidelines on ICTs at different levels and in all sectors.
• Regularly review ICT indicators to assess its use and contribution to the goals of poverty eradication at national and regional level.
• Promote the use of ICTs to increase understanding, knowledge sharing, and action on gender and human rights issues, specifically those related to HIV/AIDS and other preventable diseases that are the main causes of maternal and child morbidity and mortality.

African Union

• Develop ICT policies that are specific to Africa and promote regional integration and networking among African countries.
• Take more concrete steps towards the creation of an enabling ICT environment for women in Africa.

Civil Society

• Document best practice stories on how women’s participation in development processes at various levels has been enhanced by use of ICTs and how usage has improved their lives.
• View the digital divides at various levels as an opportunity for further engagement with women in using ICTs.
• Build capacity for collection of vital data which inform policy formulation and implementation.
• Partner more with the ICT industries (public and private) to support women's access to vital information, knowledge, skills, and opportunities for development.
• Seek to strengthen the practical and technical skills of women entrepreneurs from women's organisations through basic training on the internet, e-commerce, international trade, business management, and gender issues.

The paper concludes that by addressing challenges and seizing opportunities, ICTs can be harnessed to benefit women in various spheres - education, health, rights, etc. They can be important tools and can make a difference not only to the lives of individual women, but also to communities and countries, due to the fact that the efficacy of individuals improves their contributions to society. The paper states that empowering women through ICTs is another piece of the puzzle towards human development and a rights-based Africa.