CSW62 Side-event: “Leveraging the power of ICTs for rural women and girls”

Your Excellency, The Minister of Mali, the Ambassador of Thailand, Distinguished guests, Ladies and Gentlemen,

 

• As we have heard many times during these days, rural women and girls face disproportionate challenges when it comes to ownership of land, as well as to access of productive resources, inputs, technical advice, and financial services.

 

• This remains true when it comes to the issue of ICTs – as women often times do not have the equal opportunity to access and use ICTs.

 

• Some figures in this respect…. Women using the internet worldwide is 12 % lower than men. In Africa, the proportion of women using Internet is 25% lower than that of men.

 

• If we consider that women make up 43 % of the agricultural labor force, it is clear that without the contribution of rural women we will never achieve end poverty and hunger and never achieve the SDGs.

 

• It also means that empowering rural women and girls, including in ICTs is one of the elements to achieving a world without poverty and hunger.

 

• To ensure that ICT-based interventions fulfil their potential to empower rural women and girls, I wish to highlight three areas of special importance: relevance, accessibility and addressing root causes.

 

• First, we must address the root causes of unequal access, which are often based on cultural norms and limit women’s ability to not only gain access, but to make meaningful use of ICTs and participate in the information society. Addressing these issues in our work is not only the right thing to do, it is necessary to bridging the gender gap in ICT adoption and ensuring that rural women actually benefit from ICT-related interventions aimed at them.

 

• Second, we see from experience that for ICTs to be effective for women, they must be of interest to the rural women themselves, which means developing content which addresses their needs and involving women throughout all stages of an intervention’s design and implementation. In other words, rural women and girls should always be the starting point of our interventions, not the end point.

 

• For example, in a case study on the wildly successful mobile banking system M-Pesa in Kenya, our colleagues at GSMA (who are with us here today) found that the application was so relevant and valuable to users that it not only boosted levels of financial inclusion in Kenya, bu it also helped to bridge the country’s gender gap in mobile phone ownership.

 

• Third, is addressing accessibility. We see great potential inpublic-private partnerships as well as in strengthening local cooperatives and producers’ organizations. Cooperatives can leverage more resources than individual farmers can and are well-placed to become hubs for entire communities to gain access to ICTs such as computers or satellite-technology, and to receive training.

 

Question 2: How is FAO using ICTs to empower rural women and girls?

 

• FAO is embracing the opportunities presented by ICTs in a number of different ways. Let me share with you a few examples.

 

• FAO recognizes that in order for ICTs to contribute effectively to agricultural development, relevant actors must be guided by a coherent national strategy that addresses local realities and works to meet the actual needs and capabilities of all stakeholders.

 

• In order to achieve this, FAO has been collaborating with the ITU since 2013 to provide assistance to countries in formulating national “e-agriculture strategies, which provide countries with a roadmap for the coordination and implementation of ICT for Agriculture (ICT4Ag).

 

• The initiative has led to the successful development of the world’s first e-agriculture strategies in Bhutan, Sri Lanka, and other countries, with plans to scale up the initiative at the global level.

 

• Another example of good practices of FAO’s work for women and girls is the Dimitra project, which helps to foster women’s active participation in rural organizations, and is a successful example of building women’s capacity in their role as leaders and decision-makers.

 

• By combining traditional communication channels and information and communication technologies, Dimitra Clubs are transforming gender relations and empowering rural men and women in remote communities of sub-Saharan Africa. 

 

• Currently, there are 2000 Dimitra Clubs in Sub-Saharan Africa, with plans under way to scale-up in Latin America.

 

• Last, I would like to highlight that last year, FAO piloted its Digital Services Portfolio for Africa, which focuses on the development of mobile applications to improve farmers’ access to information and agricultural services.

 

• Four applications are currently available as part of the portfolio: Cure and Feed your Livestock, E-Nutrifood, Weather and Crop Calendar, and Agrimarketplace.

 

• In order to promote equal access for women and user-centred design, the applications provide content in local languages and allow users to choose preferred formats, including text, video and voice services. This helps to mitigate common barriers such as illiteracy and reach users with both smartphones and feature phones.

 

• FAO is also working with local mobile service providers to ensure that farmers can access these services free of charge.