Sansad TV: Empowering Women Digitally | Current Affairs & Hindu Analysis: Daily, Weekly & Monthly - UPSC PDF Download

Introduction

This year, International Women's Day was celebrated globally with the theme "DigitALL - Innovation and Technology for Gender Equality."

Digital literacy and the gender gap:

• To enable women to fully harness their potential in the digital era, it is crucial for the government to address the existing gender gaps.
• In India, there is a significant disparity in internet usage among women, particularly in rural areas. This limits the access of many women to online services, including communication, health information, education, skill development, and economic participation.
• Therefore, India faces a dual challenge in preparing its women for the digital age: increasing gender parity and bridging the urban-rural divide through targeted efforts and appropriate solutions.
• Women in rural India encounter multiple barriers to internet access and digital literacy, such as limited education, lack of awareness, poor accessibility, affordability issues, and gender-based restrictions or resistance.

How bridging this gap leads to women's empowerment

• Closing the gender gap in mobile ownership and digital literacy, both in urban and rural areas of India, can enhance women's agency and challenge long-standing social norms that have hindered their progress for decades.
• In fact, addressing the gender disparity in digital literacy is crucial to prevent a widening inequality of opportunities between genders in India, where the digital economy is projected to grow fivefold.
• A study conducted in Niger revealed that households receiving transfers via mobile phones experienced significant positive outcomes, such as improved diet diversity, increased meal consumption for children, and greater cultivation of crops primarily grown by women. This was a result of the enhanced bargaining power of women beneficiaries within their households.
• Moreover, when women were able to directly receive cash transfers through mobile phone services, it empowered them in household decision-making and reduced reliance on their husbands. By prioritizing digital literacy for women and integrating mobile technology with existing welfare programs, similar empowerment of rural women in India can be achieved.
• A case study from Kenya demonstrated the positive impact of access to M-Pesa, a mobile money service, which lifted 2% of households out of poverty. The benefits were particularly pronounced for female beneficiaries, who experienced changes in their financial behavior, including increased savings and a transition from subsistence agriculture to business ownership. This newfound agency was attributed to direct access to remittances and the shift from being secondary earners to primary earners in their households.
• Integrating mobile phones into welfare programs targeted at the poorest women can be an effective way to improve program efficiency and prevent leakages.
• Digital inclusion not only empowers women individually but also challenges harmful gender norms. Studies have shown that households where women have mobile phones exhibit lower tolerance for domestic violence, while women's autonomy in mobility and economic independence increases.
• Additionally, digital inclusion provides benefits such as access to information on health issues for community health workers and enables economic awareness and skill development for women engaged in crafts and entrepreneurship.
• By bridging the gender gap and promoting digital inclusion, women can experience greater empowerment and contribute to a more equitable society.

The way forward

• To promote women's digital media literacy, it is recommended for communities and organizations to collaborate with each other. This collaboration should aim to expand training and workshops that cater to women of different ages and skill levels in digital media literacy. Additionally, efforts should be made to increase the number of female teachers who can provide instruction in this field.
• Collaboration is crucial among various stakeholders involved in women's empowerment programs. This includes the government as policy makers and infrastructure developers, non-governmental organizations as initiators and implementers of women's empowerment initiatives, and local communities as supporters and facilitators of women's empowerment. By working together, these entities can effectively reach out to women living in rural areas and provide them with the necessary support and opportunities for empowerment.