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Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

(UNESCO for the EQUALS Skills Coalition 2019). Today billions of people have access to affordable devices and broadband networks, but especially women do not have the requisite skills to take advantage of these technologies to improve their lives. Therefore, specific and tailored training in digital literacy and adoption of solutions and above all interest and perception of technologies as benefits and utilities are important.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

(UNESCO for the EQUALS Skills Coalition 2019). Today billions of people have access to affordable devices and broadband networks, but especially women do not have the requisite skills to take advantage of these technologies to improve their lives. Therefore, specific and tailored training in digital literacy and adoption of solutions and above all interest and perception of technologies as benefits and utilities are important.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

The Women Farmers Advancement Network (WOFAN), a Nigerian-based NGO and Matching Fund partner of the Competitive African Rice Initiative (CARI) has trained 60 extension workers each in 4 states of Kano, Kaduna, Jigawa and FCT in Nigeria on advancing agriculture through the deployment of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) this year alone. The 240 Extension workers consisting out of 210 female and 30 male extension workers are expected to re-train 150 peer farmer leaders each in their various states. The training was conducted in collaboration with National Agricultural Extension and Research Liaison Services (NAERLS) of Ahmadu Bello University Zaria.

The training introduced the participants to the RiceAdvise app, an android-based solution that helps farmers and extension workers get the right needed information for proper agricultural practice as well as use of moisture meter to get accurate moisture content of crop produce before bagging. RiceAdvice was developed by AfricaRice to give field specific recommendation on fertilizer requirement based on the farmers‘ management practices.​ It is a sustainability tool that enables proper nutrient management (balancing crop nutrient requirement with nutrient in the soil). The app additionally helps tackle the issues of climate change and advise farmers on the weather through weather focus.

The Executive Director of WOFAN Hajiya Salamatu Garba: The “60 extension workers from each of the 4 states can engage over 150 farmers on modern farm technologies each, thus reaching over 36.000 farmers. If the farmers don’t get the right information, it means they have less knowledge for increasing production and mitigation of climate change.”

According to Hajiya Garba the training also includes exposing farmers and extension workers to insurance providers to secure their investments. She notes that WOFAN got insurance companies involved in the training because there was a need for farmers to know what to do in times of climate crises and losses: “We also brought in insurance providers so that they will give us the necessary products that go in line with climate shock. Last year, a lot of farmers faced flood issues and some faced drought, so now if the farmers find themselves in that situation, what will insurance companies do? Therefore, we are partnering up with them, to make sure that farmers meet up with their requirements”, she added.
The training is also looking at the use of drones in increasing productivity, advancing farmers and capturing data and the extension workers were trained on the simple deployment of drone technologies.

Speaking on the cost of the equipment, Hajia Garba said WOFAN started assisting with technology since last year as grants, adding that the grant is a revolving grant that ensures that groups that use it to generate income and the grant becomes accessible to the community.

“It means we have to look for technology and methods to which we can meet the food demand of Nigeria, it is only when we invest in such services that we can assist in providing food, which is going to be the next thing to knock off non-oil economic production in the country“.

A study conducted by CARI found that farmers that use RiceAdvice in comparison to comparable farmers in combination to good agronomic practices had a higher profit margin than non-RiceAdvice farmers. In addition to WOFAN, over 4.100 CARI rice farmers use RiceAdvice every season and achieve above average results.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

(UNESCO for the EQUALS Skills Coalition 2019). Today billions of people have access to affordable devices and broadband networks, but especially women do not have the requisite skills to take advantage of these technologies to improve their lives. Therefore, specific and tailored training in digital literacy and adoption of solutions and above all interest and perception of technologies as benefits and utilities are important.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

(UNESCO for the EQUALS Skills Coalition 2019). Today billions of people have access to affordable devices and broadband networks, but especially women do not have the requisite skills to take advantage of these technologies to improve their lives. Therefore, specific and tailored training in digital literacy and adoption of solutions and above all interest and perception of technologies as benefits and utilities are important.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.

Despite at least two decades of interventions to move closer to gender equality, digital skills gaps appear to be growing. For years, this divide was assumed to be symptomatic of technical challenges: The thinking went that women would catch up with men when the world had cheaper devices and lower connectivity prices, due to the limited purchasing power and financial independence of women compared with men.