{"id":292,"date":"2015-03-03T06:57:07","date_gmt":"2015-03-03T10:57:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cpnn-world.org\/temp\/?p=292"},"modified":"2016-10-30T23:04:57","modified_gmt":"2016-10-31T03:04:57","slug":"135-revision-v1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/?p=292","title":{"rendered":"Mobile Technology a Lever for Women\u2019s Empowerment"},"content":{"rendered":"
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.. WOMEN’S EQUALITY ..<\/p>\n


\nan article by A. D. McKenzie, Inter Press Service News Agency<\/a> (reprinted by permission and abridged)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Providing women with greater access to mobile technology could increase literacy, advance development and open up much-needed educational and employment opportunities, according to experts at the fourth United Nations\u2019 Mobile Learning Week conference [in Paris].<\/b><\/p>\n

\"2039-mobile\"<\/a><\/p>\n

For Cherie Blair (left), founder of the Cherie Blair Foundation for Women and wife of former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, \u201cempowering women and girls to access education isn\u2019t an option, isn\u2019t a nice thing to do, it\u2019s an imperative\u201d. Credit: A.D. McKenzie\/IPS
\n<\/b><\/p>\n

Click here<\/a> to enlarge photo<\/p>\n

\u201cMobile technology can offer learning where there are no books, no classrooms, even no teachers. This is especially important for women and girls who drop out of school and need second chances,\u201d said Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, Executive Director of UN Women.<\/b><\/p>\n

The agency, which focuses on gender equality and the empowerment of women, joined forces with its \u201csister\u201d organisation, the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) to host the Feb. 23-27 conference this year.<\/b><\/p>\n

The aim, UNESCO said, was to give participants a venue \u201cto learn about and discuss technology programmes, initiatives and content that are alleviating gender deficits in education.\u201d<\/b><\/p>\n

Participants from more than 70 countries shared so-called best practices and presented a range of initiatives to address the issue, including reducing the costs of access to mobile services in some developing countries, and providing training and free laptops to women teachers in countries such as Israel.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is still a persistent gender gap in access to mobile technology,\u201d said keynote speaker Cherie Blair, founder of the Cherie Blair Foundation for Women and wife of former British Prime Minister Tony Blair.<\/p>\n

In an interview on the side-lines of the conference, she told IPS that \u201canything that encourages the education of girls is important\u201d and that it was \u201cparticularly significant\u201d that UNESCO and UN Women had joined forces to work together in this area to achieve results.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to encourage women to use technology and we also need to involve men to provide support,\u201d Blair said. She cited research showing that a woman in a low- or middle-income country is 21 percent less likely than a man to own a mobile phone. In Africa, the figure is 23 percent less likely, and in the Middle East and South Asia 24 percent and 37 percent respectively.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe reasons women cite for not owning a mobile phone include the costs of handsets and data plans, lack of need and fear of not being able to master the technology,\u201d Blair said.<\/p>\n

Yet, according to the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), mobile phones are the \u201cmost pervasive and rapidly adopted technology in history\u201d, with six billion of the world\u2019s seven billion people now having access.<\/p>\n

If there existed gender parity in this access, women could benefit from the technology in a number of ways, including getting information about healthcare and other services, experts said. . .<\/p>\n

Both UNESCO Director General Irina Bokova and Cherie Blair described education as a\u00a0\u201chuman rights imperative\u201d as well as a development and security imperative.<\/p>\n

They stressed that the goal of achieving gender equality in education will continue for the post-2015 development agenda, and that technology has an important role to play. \u201cEmpowering women and girls to access education isn\u2019t an option, isn\u2019t a nice thing to do, it\u2019s an imperative,\u201d Blair said.<\/p>\n

[Thank you to Janet Hudgins, the CPNN reporter for this article.]<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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.. WOMEN’S EQUALITY .. an article by A. D. McKenzie, Inter Press Service News Agency (reprinted by permission and abridged) Providing women with greater access to mobile technology could increase literacy, advance development and open up much-needed educational and employment opportunities, according to experts at the fourth United Nations\u2019 Mobile Learning Week conference [in Paris]. … Continue reading Mobile Technology a Lever for Women\u2019s Empowerment<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[76,12],"tags":[11],"class_list":["post-292","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-global","category-women","tag-global"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=292"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}