Tapping Into AI To Inspire Inclusion For Women

On March 8^th, the world marked International Women’s Day (IWD) under the campaign theme ‘Inspire Inclusion.’ This theme was set against a backdrop of reflection as the world approaches the halfway mark towards the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

The UN Women report “Progress on the Sustainable Development Goals: The Gender Snapshot 2023” gives us cause for concern. If current trends continue, over 340 million women and girls will still live in extreme poverty by 2030. We therefore need to accelerate our pace by 26 times to reach the No Poverty goal by 2030.

Additionally, it is estimated that one in four women and girls are expected to be moderately or severely food insecure by 2030. This is in a world where 80 percent of the global population will live across Africa and Asia.

We are also in the early days of developments in the emerging technologies universe such as robotics, biotechnology, and the sometimes-controversial artificial intelligence (AI) all fueling a fourth industrial revolution. If deployed effectively and responsibly, these technologies can be powerful accelerants to hasten growth and productivity.

The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa estimates that AI alone could inject US$1.5 trillion into the African economy by 2030. Unlike in the past where women were locked out of major conversations, they are now at a vantage position to proactively shape the new world order.

The world of AI presents women with a tremendous opportunity to not only inspire inclusion but to compel inclusion for groups that continue to be excluded through poverty, disease, and education.

Closing the gap

Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) skills will be in high demand in this new AI world. Unfortunately, the uptake of STEM courses in Africa has been extremely low with less than 25 percent of higher education students pursuing STEM fields, of whom less than 30 percent are women.

While the scarcity of an AI ready workforce in Africa is a cause for concern, it also presents a huge opportunity for women to inspire inclusion. Women must play a leading role in transforming Africa’s youth – projected 362 million young people between 15-24 years by 2025 – into a highly skilled AI ready workforce.

There are massive business opportunities for women to play a leading role ranging from developing learning software, dismantling biases about STEM to building educational infrastructure.

In Sub-Saharan Africa, agriculture accounts for approximately 21 percent of the continent’s GDP. Women contribute 60-80 percent of the labour used to produce food both for household consumption and for sale.

The incorporation of AI in agriculture will benefit women by improving productivity and efficiency. The AI world opens the door for farmers to use drone technology to plant and fertilize seeds or use AI-powered analytics of crop data to identify diseases and enable soil health. They can also tap into farmer friendly AI solutions such as FarmDrive™, a Kenyan alternative credit scoring platform that uses mobile phones, alternative data, and machine learning to close the critical data gap.

Women and business

In Africa, micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) space must seize the numerous opportunities the AI revolution presents. MSMEs constitute nearly 90 percent of all businesses and generate over two-thirds of employment opportunities with most of them being women-led or women-owned.

At Stanbic Kenya, our journey to provide digital skills started in 2021 when we launched a Global Skills Initiative program dubbed the Accelerate Future ni Digital. This is a partnership between the Stanbic Kenya Foundation, Microsoft Kenya and the Ministry of Trade, Investments, and Industry.

Through this platform women are using digital skills to take advantage of AI, providing them with the tools they need to find new opportunities in the digital age. Through similar initiatives, we will continue to support women entrepreneurs seeking to leverage AI.

Emerging technologies as a gamechanger

Women can play a critical role in demystifying AI and normalising its use in all spheres of life. In the last 50 years, women have sharpened their skills in pushing for legislative changes, shaping organisational behaviour, and eliminating biases and stereotypes to create an equitable workplace.

African countries have made remarkable strides in fostering a favourable environment for women to fully participate in their countries’ economies. They have spearheaded the breaking down of barriers by addressing discriminatory behaviours and biases that block women’s participation and potential.

We can see the results in the financial services sector where we have bridged the gender pay gap and witnessed a higher representation of women in managerial and executive positions. Over the years, we have made progress in achieving improved gender balance in our top-level structures including senior management, executive and board levels. As a bank, we actively seek to achieve gender equality at the workplace. To date, our employee gender number sits at male 51:49 female. Eight out of 14 executives in our Kenya leadership team are women and three out of six are at Board level. To create a sustainable and meaningful change towards increasing women’s participation, top leadership commitment is critical.

Women should be at the forefront of helping African stakeholders come together to ensure the “democratisation” of emerging technologies in Africa, so that they are accessible to people from diverse demographic, gender, ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds.

AI to improve women’s careers

Unconscious bias is a factor in recruitment decisions, leading to gender imbalances in the workplace.

Generative AI, when trained and monitored correctly, can provide a more objective evaluation of job candidates based on their qualifications, skills, and experience, thereby bringing more women into the workplace.

The use of AI has a significant impact on automating repetitive jobs, optimising workflows, and raising productivity levels thus freeing up women to focus on high-impact, strategic areas of their work. This way, women can balance their personal and professional life by cutting down on time spent on repetitive chores and then invest quality time with their families, offer intentional support for their children and play a greater role in their communities.

AI can be a double-edged sword yielding great benefits on one hand while introducing a host of challenges on the other. Women must work with cross-sectional stakeholders to manage emerging risks such as” deep fakes” that mainly prey on women.

For us to truly inspire inclusion, we must create a holistic ecosystem where women and girls have the opportunity, knowledge, and resources to participate meaningfully in shaping a future where women grow and thrive in all spheres of their lives.

This article was written by, Dr. Joshua Oigara is the Chief Executive, Stanbic Bank Kenya and South Sudan.