Empowering women in GIT – Lessons from SERVIR-HKH

Abstract:

The advancements and innovations in geographic information technology (GIT) and Earth observation (EO) have rapidly extended the vast circumference of research perspectives affecting the gendered social relations as well. While the technology is agile with transformations, the workforce is merely coping with the changing technology particularly in the Hindu Kush Himalaya (HKH) region due to the lack of expertise and poor gender balance. To bridge the workforce and gender gap, we implemented a new cross-cutting training concept of “Empowering women in GIT” in our capacity building activities to empower and encourage the young women to consider careers in GIT.

The trainings were carried out sequentially from 2018 to 2020 including 3 trainings for Nepali and 1 training for Pakistani young women respectively. An analysis carried out on build capacity for all the trainings revealed an overall number of participants empowered to be 175 from 88 distinct institutions. The short term monitoring revealed an overall gain of ~29% and ~33% under science knowledge and ~38% and ~29% under skill related topics for advanced and intermediate level respectively. Overall, ~62% and ~67% of the knowledge shift from low and very low level to higher level was observed. The effectiveness of the training measured by relevancy and quality questionnaires revealed the significant high quality of the trainings as responded by > 85% of the participants.

The approach to bridge the gender gap in GIT via above training showed an impactful outcome as most participants responded to have confidence in utilizing the knowledge in their various professional fields and research areas. The initiative is not only reshaping the theoretical understandings of the technology but also gearing towards helping women navigate their careers in geospatial industries. This will help in making them leaders in the field of GIT and will also support our efforts to bridge the gender gap in the region. In this presentation, we will share our experiences on contribution towards empowering women in GIT and limitations in particular context of HKH region.