Leaving No One Behind in a Digital World
Many Angolan women can still only dream of owning a smartphone and having access to the internet. Men, however, have long been able to surf the web. This inequality has significant political and economic consequences.
So where does this gap come from?
Illiteracy and a lack of internet knowledge, unaffordable mobile data, irrelevant content, and a lack of security.
"Being able to use a mobile phone and being able to access the internet requires certain skills, including literacy, as well as digital skills." And if you look at education on the continent, many women fall behind men in terms of literacy levels.
There are many women like our heroines across Africa. Some 200 million Africans are still offline — either voluntarily or involuntarily. Only two out of three women own a cell phone and barely one in three uses their mobile data on a regular basis. Seven out of 10 online mobile users are men. This phenomenon is known as the 'Mobile Gender Gap,' which is currently at 41 percent.
*Africa's Mobile Gender Gap: Millions of African women still offline.
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