The Role of ICT in Women's Empowerment in Rural\ud Bangladesh

Rural women in Bangladesh have limited access to resources and public\ud spheres due to socio-cultural restrictions. Women suffer from severe\ud discrimination, and it is thought this is heightened due to a lack of access to\ud information. Information communication and technology (ICT) is a potential tool\ud that can reach rural women and enrich their knowledge. This paper discusses\ud women‟s empowerment in terms of perceptual change in rural villages in\ud Bangladesh after ICT intervention has been introduced by Non-Government\ud Organizations (NGOs). Since empowerment is a complex phenomenon to measure\ud because of its multidimensional aspects and its relationship with time as a process,\ud the methodology used in this research was an integration of qualitative and\ud quantitative methods. Using a structured questionnaire, data was collected from\ud women in two different villages where ICT projects have been introduced. The\ud change in women‟s perception after using ICT was compared with changes in\ud women who did not use ICT. The results indicate that ICT intervention changed\ud women‟s perception in a positive direction in one village but it did not change in\ud the other village

Cognitive change in women's empowerment in rural Bangladesh

Rural women in Bangladesh have limited access to resources and public spheres due to socio-cultural restrictions. Women suffer from severe discrimination, due partly to a lack of access to information. Information and communication and technologies (ICT) are tools that potentially can reach rural women and address their knowledge and information needs. Considering this scenario, the aim of this paper is to examine the situation of rural women using ICT tools provided by non-government and government organizations, and investigate whether access to ICT has changed their lives in terms of socio-economic development. Using a structured questionnaire, data was collected from women in villages where two different ICT projects have been introduced. The change in women's awareness, skills and knowledge of the wider environment on various issues (including health, education, legal rights) is described. These cognitive changes were compared in women with ICT intervention and women who did not use ICT. The overall cognitive awareness of the women indicates more changes among women with ICT intervention than without. Therefore, ICT intervention in rural villages in Bangladesh is leading to empowerment

Information Communication Technology (ICT) and Women Empowerment for Rural Area

Women at rural area should be empowered in order to help family income. In some cases, they have a productive activity to help in increasing the family income; such as having a small home industry, etc. Therefore, in supporting their economic activity, media or Information Communication  Technology  (ICT) is not significantly  becoming  a point to raise the family income or to improve the quality of society development. While in some countries, ICT is part of poverty reduction program, could help in increasing the family economy and also is used by women for their productive activities. Thus, it is also needed the women’s role, while so far, it is not  calculated  in. This  paper  is to  explore  about  how  media  ICT  could  be part  of women empowerment in helping to improve their family income especially for rural area. The result shown that in some developing countries, ICT has benefit for women in improving the family income

Women Empowerment through Mobile Phone: Case Study of Bangladesh

Telecommunication particularly Mobile technology is one of the most powerful tools worldwide Mobile phones play a foremost part in development programs around the world The diffusion of mobile phones performs a great role in development programs along with overall empowerment in developing countries Telecommunication is most powerful to combat poverty and give the people a chance to change their fate their economy their society and to empower themselves to change the world especially for women Large sections of women in Bangladesh are living in rural areas The majority of them are still tradition-bound and are in a disadvantageous position Because of inequality in women s access to and participation in all communication systems and their lack of sufficient mobility to promote their contribution to society women are deprived in every aspect of life Mobility is a very important factor for women s empowerment The Mobile phone revealed the opportunities and freedom for women to make their own choices improve their social network change their attitudes and change their lif

Sustainable Rural Development through Union Digital Center: The Citizen Empowerment Perspective

Sustainable development depends on the empowerment of the vast portion of rural people. Bangladesh Government has taken initiatives to empower the disadvantaged people (i.e., elderly, poor and minority) through digitalization programs, e.g., union digital centers (UDCs). This study aimed to investigate the influential factors on the empowerment process by adopting the individual and collective empowerment dimensions. A total of 400 rural people were selected with a judgmental sampling process and provided a structured questionnaire. Data were analyzed by using SPSS for descriptive analysis and CB-SEM using AMOS for effect assessment. Individual empowerment and collective empowerment have significant impacts on sustainable development. It is argued that for sustainable development and reaching development benefits to every house, rural people must be empowered. The findings will contribute to the body of knowledge theoretically and assume policymakers insights to focus on rural people's development with the nation. Future researchers can add other social factors. Keywords: Union Digital Center, Social Inclusion, Empowerment, Sustainable Development

Exploring ‘Gender-ICT-Climate Change’ Nexus in Development: from Digital Divide to Digital Empowerment

How gender influences the effectiveness of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in tackling climate change is under-researched. Gender is social expectations and stereotypes of how men, women, boys and girls, should behave in society. Gender enables some groups of men and women to get access to ICTs, whilst constraining others from doing so. Different control over ICTs, built on unequal power relationships, affects how poor people adapt to the changing climate and respond to climate-related disasters. Conceptually, this paper explains why, and how, women are more constrained than men from using ICTs in tackling climate change. In term of assets, compared to men, women have less access to technology, to information, to finance, and are more deprived of land rights. Women are more institutionally-constrained than men. With regard to social structures, women are excluded from decision-making in policy design and resource allocation. They are less represented in formal decision-making bodies, such as the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and the Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD) initiative. In addressing these limitations, this paper makes four digital empowerment proposals in an attempt to make 'ICT-climate change' interventions more gender-sensitive: (1) Contextualise gender mainstreaming: gender mainstreaming helps integrate gender analysis into ICT policies. It acknowledges that men and women perceive and receive information differently, and that this requires diverse approaches to adaptation. However, the attempt to re-position women and girls as 'eco-carers' is problematic because this fails to capture their protective, as well as their destructive, role in relation to natural resources. Without addressing the unequal power relations between women and girls, e-adaptive practices can also help reproduce the inter-generational equalities. (2) Strengthen governance: crafting new and reforming old, institutional arrangements is essential to improve gender inclusion. Women-only interventions are sometimes necessary to empower previously-excluded women to engage in ICT-related decisions. However, poor and powerless men should also have their say in climate change policies. (3) Develop gender-sensitive funding mechanisms: securing adequate funding to support ICT interventions is crucial to gender empowerment. Yet, targeting women by micro-credit projects risk putting an additional financial burden on them, and that needs serious re-consideration. (4) Recognise agency-structure dynamics: women are active agents, but they are socially constrained from engaging in ICT-related decisions. Women's preferences, institutional arrangements and politics need to be taken into account in order to tackle digital exclusion. These four proposals will be useful for development agencies, governments and NGOs seeking to improve the gendered outcomes from use of ICTs in response to climate change

Building sustainable digital communities: A five-pronged social-informatics research approach in Bangladesh

In a developing society, critical issues highlighted are not just about the technology, but with social factors such as culture, institutions, organizational issues, and individual identities. Understanding such factors is significant to illustrate how best to create sustainable communities using technology. Researchers at Monash University have collaborated with Oxfam International and developed a 5-year international development project known as PROTIC. This paper aims to give readers an overview of the PROTIC project and describe how the five doctoral research students are designing their research to achieve a common goal of developing sustainable digital communities in Bangladesh. The students follow different research methods in their respective projects, targeting overall long-term sustainability for the vulnerable communities identified in each of their studies. Although using five distinct research project approaches, the PROTIC project aims to use the exploratory study to make information and communication technologies (ICT) more sustainable for underserved communities. The findings from these researchers will impact on design and implementation of ICT-based socio-economic development projects undertaken by international development organizations

‘I don’t care about their reactions’: agency and ICTs in women’s empowerment in Afghanistan

Gender justice and women’s empowerment are both an end and a goal of sustainable development, and information and communication technology for development (ICT4D) policies and monitoring needs to be informed by this understanding. This article draws on research from Afghanistan exploring how women’s empowerment is conceptualised in relation to information and communication technologies (ICTs) currently, and how ICTs are used in processes intended to support empowerment. Our research shows that women in Afghanistan have high hopes that ICTs will be enabling and empowering. Yet the majority of women’s ICT activities do not realise that vision; with a few exceptions around women’s health, ICTs usually only enable women to meet their existing needs, and do not enable them to challenge patriarchal power relations. According to our respondents, using ICT for purposes that challenge patriarchy – e.g. using the internet to learn about rights to divorce or citizen’s rights, or sharing ‘private’ stories of abuse in social media spaces – has a high risk of social repercussions. We argue that these warnings and responses urge women to conform, and submit to control, and regulate women’s interactions and movements. They limit women’s choices, options, and power. However, some Afghan women in our research rejected these attempts to control and regulate – ‘I don’t care about their reactions’. This offers hope that for some individuals in some contexts, ICTs can put a dent in patriarchal power, supporting and furthering women’s empowerment

Gender Equality as Smart Economics: World Bank Group Gender Action Plan Four-Year Progress Report (January 2007-December 2010)

This document presents gender equality as smart economics. Launched in 2007, the World Bank Group Action Plan -- Gender Equality as Smart Economics (GAP) aimed to advance women?s economic empowerment by redefining the way the Bank does business in the economic sectors. The GAP focused on increasing women?s access and participation in four key markets: labor, land and agriculture, private sector development and finance, and infrastructure, which underpins access to all markets. It spanned a four-year timeframe and four main action areas: operations; results-based initiatives; research, impact evaluation and statistics; and communications. This fourth and last annual progress report summarizes the main accomplishments of the World Bank Group Gender Action Plan "Gender Equality as Smart Economics" (GAP) over the four years (2007-2010) and discusses lessons learned and remaining challenges to further institutionalize gender mainstreaming at the Bank. The report reviews initial conditions and changes over the period (section II); summarizes GAP resource mobilization and governance (III), and accomplishments and lessons learned (sections IV and V), and outlines the challenges and next steps (section IV)