Womenomics must take centre stage in this digital age
is a former director general of Doordarshan and All India Radio.
Access to the internet is an essential human right,” declared the United Nations Human Rights Council in 2016. Yet, globally, about 2.6 billion people remain deprived of it and 57% of them are women, with a global digital gender gap of 8%. Only 19% of women in least developed countries used such a facility in 2020, as against 86% in the developed world.
As a pandemic-ravaged world necessitated rapid digitization, it had a profound impact on the employment landscape. It has been estimated that such disruptive changes are likely to create 70% of all new value, with digitally-enabled business models at the forefront, and 85% of all jobs that don’t yet exist. However, this impending scenario, because of social instability and an unequal concentration of power and wealth, is fraught with the risk of exacerbating the exclusion of women. By 2030, about 40-160 million women need to transition to other occupations with more complex digital, cognitive, social and emotional skills for being employment-worthy, as an International Telecom Union (ITU) study shows. While women’s digital and tech-related literacy has been abysmally low, men are found to be four times more likely than women to be specialists in information-communication technology (ICT). At age 15, on average, only 0.5% of girls wish to become ICT professionals, compared to 5% of boys. Women-owned startups receive 23% less funding and are 30% less likely to get a positive exit path compared to male-owned businesses, according to OECD data. Women make up one-third of the workforce at the world’s 20 largest tech companies, but hold only onefourth of their leadership positions (UN Women). In fintech firms, women represent less than 13% of leadership (as founders or board members), even less than their representation in traditional banking and tech companies (LinkedIn).
According to UN Women estimates, the low presence of women in a surging digital world has meant a staggering $1 trillion has gone missing over the past decade from the GDP of low- and middle-income countries, a gap likely to grow to $1.5 trillion by 2025. A study in 32 low and lower-middle income countries revealed that reducing the gender gap could boost GDP by approximately $524 billion by 2025. Unfortunately, 40% of countries studied had no meaningful policy initiatives to expand women’s access to the internet. In Southeast Asia and Africa, it would put nearly $300 billion in the hands of women entrepreneurs, and could add $280 billion to the value of Southeast Asia’s e-commerce market and $14.5 billion to Africa’s between 2025 and 2030 (IFC).
According to researchers, India accounts for half the world’s gender-based digital divide. Gender-unequal social norms, locational disadvantages and lack of technology related education are considered the major contributing factors.
Only one in three Indian women have used the internet, compared to 57% of Indian men. In rural India, men are twice as likely to have used the internet than women (NFHS, 2019-21). The country’s rural broadband penetration is only 29%, against the national average of 51%. An income-based digital divide also stands as an impediment. In low-income households earning less than $2 per day, each gigabyte of data costs nearly 3% of their monthly income. In 2020, the Supreme Court proclaimed digital access a ‘fundamental right,’ but progress has been slow on this front.
The fear of harm deters more than 50% of women from expressing themselves freely in the digital realm, and 68% of abuses takes place on social media platforms (Unicef). In some regions of South Asia, social norms stand in the way of women’s use of digital devices, and they are 20% less likely to own a smartphone than men (USAID, 2021). In many households in Indonesia, Myanmar, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Sri Lanka, women and girls depend on the permission of men at home to use a mobile phone, let alone own one. In Afghanistan, the Taliban government has banned telecom companies and shop owners from selling mobile SIM cards to women. In India, during the pandemic, when
The full and equal participation of women in all economic spheres is a must for sustainable, equitable and inclusive growth. For this, ‘womenomics’ needs to take centre stage. teaching material for rural students was being distributed over WhatsApp, nearly a tenth of parents purchased a smartphone despite household budget constraints, but many families were keen to ensure their sons did not miss out and failed to extend the same privilege to their daughters.
Last year’s New Delhi summit of the G20 announced a collective aim to “halve the digital gender gap by 2030.” This project needs acceleration. It will enable greater women’s participation in India’s labour force, a measure on which our latest finding of 37% (PLFS 2023) remains far below the world average. It has been estimated that India’s economy could grow 1 percentage point faster with 50% women’s labour force participation, which would make a major difference to India’s development goals.
The full and equal participation of women in all economic spheres is a must for sustainable, equitable and inclusive growth. In other words, it is time for ‘womenomics’ to take centre stage. In the digital economy, especially, women should be key participants not just in value and wealth generation, but also in the formulation of gender-responsive policies. We need upskilling, access and safety, even as we challenge normative barriers, beliefs and stereotypes.