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Clearly, Kennedy’s "rest of the world" doesn’t include most of the developing world, where women’s Internet access often lags substantially behind that of men. Although getting accurate statistics of women’s Internet access and use in developing countries is difficult, "it is clear that the numbers are small and the distribution limited.2 And this in regions where Internet access may stand – as in Africa – at less than one percent of the total population.3

This brief article looks at some of the issues around gender and ICTs for development, and at the way Women’s Net in South Africa is addressing them.

The importance of Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) for development has been widely documented. Why does gender deserve particular attention?

The emerging global information society can either advance the status of women and improve their conditions, or it can marginalize them further. There are a number of compelling reasons for addressing issues around women and ICTs specifically, and for developing initiatives to support and promote women’s use of ICTs in developing countries:

l	Disparities in access to and use of ICTs may exacerbate existing disparities: "the underlying trend is that privileged groups acquire and use technology more effectively, and because the technology benefits them in an exponential way, they become even more privileged."4 Gender is a significant predictor of socio-economic inequities in most developing countries, and lack of access (in the fullest sense) to ICTs may compound other social and economic divides.
l	Conversely, ICTs may be used to help overcome existing disparities. Appropriate use of ICTs can help women access information and knowledge to help them overcome poverty and marginalization. ICTs are an important source of power. By gaining access to ICTs, women gain access to that power.
l	Development initiatives – including those in the area of ICTs – which focus on women have a significant impact on society as a whole. As UN Secretary General Kofi Annan explains it "no" development strategy is better than the one that involves women as central players. It has immediate benefits for nutrition, health, savings and reinvestment at the family, community and, ultimately country level.5

The term "digital divide" is a simple one which can easily mask the complexities of the relationship between technology and development. Rather than being a single "divide", the digital divide is really a continuum across a number of dimensions including:

Understanding, mapping and bridging the "digital divide" is a question not just of numbers, but of ensuring that ICTs can be used meaningfully and effectively. This requires a very particular concern with the socio-economic context within which ICT initiatives are introduced. "Access to ICTs" should, in its fullest sense, be understood as access to skills, to useful content, to opportunities for disseminating local information, and to opportunities to help shape technologies and technology-related policies.

The value of ICTs for development lies not in the technology itself, but in the information and communication it promotes. The question is thus not only "how many women are online?" but "what will they find when they get there, and how will it help them?" The value of ICTs must in large measure be understood at the local level, not in terms of some generic global "women’s content."

Bridges.org’s "real access" criteria provides a useful way of assessing access to ICTs in a development context in general:

l	Physical access: Is technology available and physically accessible?
l	Appropriate technology: What is the appropriate technology according to local conditions, and how people need and want to put technology to use?
l	Affordability: Is technology access affordable for people to use?
l	Capacity: Do people understand how to use technology and its potential uses?
l	Relevant content: Is there locally relevant content, especially in terms of language?
l	Integration: Does the technology further burden people’s lives or does it integrate into daily routines?
l	Socio-cultural factors: Are people limited in their use of technology based on gender, race, or other socio-cultural factors?
l	Trust: Do people have confidence in and understand the implications of the technology they use, for instance in terms of privacy, security, or cybercrime?
l	Legal and regulatory framework: How do laws and regulations affect technology use and what changes are needed to create an environment that fosters its use?
l	Local economic environment: Is there a local economy that can and will sustain technology use?
l	Macro-economic environment: Is national economic policy conducive to widespread technology use, for example, in terms of transparency, deregulation, investment, and labour issues?
l	Political will: Is there political will in government to do what is needed to enable the integration of technology throughout society?6

These criteria should also be used to assess women’s access to ICTs, and to inform the development of ICT related projects targeting women in developing countries.

The Women’sNet project in South Africa is one example of a local project which adopts a multi-faceted approach to empower women through the use of ICTs.

Women’sNet was established in 1997 as a joint project of the Commission for Gender Equality – a statutory body established through the South African constitution, and SANGONeT, a South African NGO which provides a broad range of ICT services.

The project was initiated at a time – only a few years after South Africa’s first democratic government was elected - when the country’s women’s movement was growing rapidly. Many new grassroots gender projects and organizations were emerging, but often these initiatives had little knowledge of each other. At that time South Africa had (as it continues to have) the highest level of Internet connectivity in Africa. This penetration did not automatically bring with it for effective use of the tools for development or social activism and – as in most countries – access is stratified along a variety, of dimensions including geographic, economic, class and gender.

Women’sNet addresses women’s access to ICTs in the broadest sense, combining an information portal with capacity building, advocacy, and policy work. Women’sNet’s audience ranges from gender activists to the general public. The project’s mission is to

l	make ICTs accessible to women, particularly those who have been historically disadvantaged
l	provide responsive gender-sensitive training and support
l	link projects, people, tools and resources
l	create a platform for women’s voices and issues
l	facilitate the dissemination of information in formats accessible to women who are not directly linked to the Internet

One of the aims of Women’sNet has been to provide a "one-stop shop" for information on women’s and gender issues in South Africa. The portal site at http://www.womensnet.org.za offers primers and links to information on:

Information ranges from practical resources (for example where to get help if you are subjected to domestic abuse, where to get HIV/AIDS counselling) to resources for activists (for example running online campaigns).

Other components of the portal are a calendar of events, a bulletin board, a directory of South African women’s organizations, and an "Everyday Activist" section which provides a space "where women can contribute to existing campaigns and make our voices heard when we see or hear gender inequality." The portal also serves as a news aggregator, harvesting news from gender mailing lists and web sites on topics ranging from analysis of current political events to social issues which impact on women.

The Women’sNet model has always rested on three pillars: information generation linked to networking and capacity building. Examples of how content development has gone hand-in-hand with capacity development of other women’s organisations include the work done in preparation of the Violence Against Women site, the human rights site, and the governance (especially the women and elections) site. In the context of building networks for action, this is a tried and tested developmental model for ICT work, and has underpinned all Women’sNet capacity development and content generation activities. This approach also ensures the long-term sustainability of Women’sNet as it builds a community of users through its capacity development activities, while at the same time building locally relevant content that attracts users back to the site.

Underpinning Women’sNet’s priorities is a philosophy and approach of working in partnership with women’s organisations, and working in ways that empower these partners. The experiences of the last five years confirm that these objectives are best attained through an approach that links content generation in an integrated way with capacity development, and advocacy and networking. q

The authors are ICT professionals affilitated to the APC Network, South Africa