Gender equity simply refers to fairness or impartiality in the treatment of women and men, according to their respective needs. Whereas gender equity speaks to fairness in treatment, gender equality advocates for equal rights, responsibilities and opportunities. In 2020, the Guardian wrote a piece titled “Ten years on, why are there still so few women in tech?” to question the underrepresentation of women in tech and today, three years later, nothing changed. Although women make up 47.7% of the global workforce, they only represent 26.7% of tech professionals as of 2022. In fact, the percentage of women in the tech industry decreased by 2.1% between 2020 and 2022. See the chart below.
The percentage of women in the tech sector is not only low but is on the decline. This lacuna is not due to a shortage of women with tech-related qualifications. As a matter of fact, women hold 44% of STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) related bachelor’s degrees globally as of 2022. Rather, more than 50% of women working in tech report that it is due to experiences of gender inequality, discrimination, and sexual harassment in the sector.
The gap is even more evident in Africa’s tech sector. Whereas 47% of STEM graduates across African universities are women, only 30% of this population are tech professionals. Hence, the problem is not the lack of qualified female tech professionals, but an equitable representation of women in the sector. Further research highlights that women are 1.6 times more likely to be laid off than men, stemming from their persistent lack of seniority compared with male colleagues in the sector. This was established by the WomenTech Network’s report which shows that 69.2% of tech professionals laid off in 2022 were women. In addition, data has proven the gender pay gap in the tech sector. On average, women are paid 1.8 per cent less salary compared to their male counterparts when they apply for the same role at the same company in the technology industry. This remuneration disparity is not a function of qualification, skill set or professional experience, but gender. A recent report has also shown a significant bias in tech startup investment – according to Africa: the Big Deal Report, only 7.57% of the total funding awarded in 2022 was received by female single founders and female-only founding teams. See the chart below.
You may ask, why a discussion on gender equity in tech matters? There are myriad reasons – firstly, innovation needs diversity. Research from within and outside the technology sector shows that better solutions are created when the developers fully represent the diversity of society. Indeed, if the tech sector is only dominated by a portion of our population, it means the solution and innovations created would be limited to the perspective of that population. Without the contribution of women, many opportunities and challenges will be missed or only partially solved.
In addition, women in Africa make up 46.2% of the continent’s workforce, 58% of the self-employed population and contribute about 13% of the continent’s GDP. Yet, economic challenges in Africa with regard to unemployment and income inequality affect them the most. In spite of their capacity, skills and potential, a sizable number of African women end up relying more on the male gender for survival. This could be solved by strategically positioning women in jobs with higher demand and higher pay. For example, STEM jobs are in high demand and are well-paid – increasing female participation in the tech sector is one of the feasible pathways to lifting this critical mass out of economic hardship and balancing out income inequality.
Finally, if one in every eight persons in the world will be an African woman by 2050 then gender inequity in the tech sector would mean depriving Africa and the world of significant contributions in innovation and revenue that these women could bring to the table.
Way forward
To change the narrative, we need to transcend the traditional notion of female empowerment which focuses on skills with low economic value, to upskilling African young women with 21st-century relevant and in-demand technology skills like cloud computing, software development, data analysis, and digital marketing, among others. The founder of She Code Africa, Ada NdukaOyomthe while speaking at the 2022 Lagos state Economic Summit reiterated that “women need to be carried along. We need to be aware of the digital space and there should be an infrastructure available to enable us to enter the tech space.” Women should be encouraged and supported to get involved and not see technology as a masculine career.
Achieving this requires consciously investing in breaking the cultural bias towards female tech education, access to tech-related opportunities, and gender equity for both male and female tech professionals. Hence, initiatives that upskill women with tech skills or provide tech training scholarships for women should be supported for greater impact. Such initiatives include She Code Africa – an enterprise that directly provides resources and skills to women hoping to break into tech, and Zuri, co-founded by Seyi Onifade, which uses Zoom, YouTube and recorded videos to help women develop in technology and rise through the ranks of companies. In addition to training women, these organizations also connect their students with mentors and tech-related job opportunities.
Furthermore, funding tech innovation and startups should be unbiased, transparent and merit-based, not gender-based. In the report titled: In search of Equity; Exploring Africa’s Gender Cap in Start-up Finance by World Bank’s Africa Gender Innovation Lab (GIL) and Briter Bridges, it was stated that “even when both genders innovate in sectors with high investor interest, all-female teams are still less likely to receive financing than all-male teams –and they receive smaller amounts, even when they do receive financing.” To ensure an unbiased selection process, we encourage venture capitalists, angel investors, incubators, accelerators and other investors to develop a merit-based standard or uniform grading framework that will guide them in the selection of startups and innovations to fund.
Increased opportunities and scholarships in tech should be provided for women, and initiatives providing capacity-building for women should be well-funded and supported. In addition, investors should endeavour to develop a merit-based transparent standard or grading frameworks that guide in the selection of startups to ensure fairness. Finally, more women should be encouraged to get participate in innovation and technology.
About the Author(s)
Olayide Oyeleke is an associate at The AR Initiative; where Dr Emma Etim is the Head of Research.
