ADEA Celebrates with Women on the 2023 International Women's Day

ADEA Team Building in Abidjan

Today is International Women’s Day. The world is commemorating the impact, value-add and the role of women in nurturing children while leveraging innovation and technology. For #IWD2023, the global community is drawing attention to the need for all to #EmbraceEquity under this year’s theme of #DigitALL: Innovation and technology for gender equality. It is to highlight the expanding role of innovative technology in promoting gender equality and meeting the health and developmental needs of women and girls. 

Education in Africa is on a recovery path, especially following the COVID-19 pandemic that reduced access to learning for many young Africans, especially women and girls. Technology and innovation are at the heart of this recovery and ADEA recognises the role of technology in its vision for education in Africa. We believe that technology is a tool to democratise access and improve the relevance and quality of education and learning, especially for pro-poor households that depend on learning to grow. Technology is also the essence of our desire to nurture an improved learning system that trains Africans to create value. Through technology, ADEA believes we can grow a new type of workforce; a new crop of experts in Artificial Intelligence, Data Science, Machine Learning, Software Engineering, Business Analysis, UI/UX, and Network Administration who will leverage their new knowledge to catalyse Africa’s growth. 

To give added impetus to our belief in the role of technology, ADEA has, working with our partners, completed several studies and initiatives towards deepening the role of technology, especially as it gives more access to women and girls. For example, we have partnered with the Lego Foundation to roll out activities that promote Play-based STEM education; this includes a situational assessment of Play-Based STEM uptake in eight African countries. We have worked with the Islamic Development Bank and the African Development Bank Group to implement a study on ICT in Education. The report for this study will be launched in Senegal this June 2023. ADEA is also working with the Mastercard Foundation to promote EdTech, working with youths, including young girls. ADEA featured on EdTech Mondays on CNBC Africa, where our Executive Secretary discussed the linkage between technology and learning. Our initiative on Remote Education Benchmarking Toolkit is another way we are providing policy direction on the use of technology in education to countries in Africa leveraging technology to deliver learning, especially to vulnerable groups. 

ADEA believes strongly in giving voice, access and equity to women and we know that technology and innovation is key in this regard, hence our unreserved support for policies and programmes that are technology driven. We join local, regional, continental and global partners to commemorate this day. Women and girls are at the core of what we do and promoting equity and balance will ensure that we realise a progressive and prosperous Africa. 

Happy International Women’s Day!