Today, 8th March 2019, is International Women’s Day. It is a day to drive gender balance across the world and reflect on the value of women, particularly in the technology industry.

Women make up a large number of technology consumers in the world. They are a major marketing target for many technology innovations. However, they are grossly underrepresented in the business world of technology.

The workplace is unfair to women all over the world, thus prompting the need for their empowerment. It is particularly worse in tech as courses such as Engineering, Computer Technology and Information Technology are dominated by male students, especially at the tertiary level.

This exemption from making major contributions to technology stems from years of discouraging the girl child from getting involved in science and technology-related subjects right from elementary school.

This is particularly unsustainable and unacceptable because there is a huge gap that needs to be filled by women in the development of technology, especially in the African context.

Women pulling their weight in tech is long overdue, and the society needs to be a healthy place to develop the talent of young girls who have interest and potential.

According to research, having a woman in a team leads to an increase in the success rate of the team. Encouraging women in tech will go a long way to move Africa forward.

By encouraging women to go into technology, we will be able to convince upcoming generations that there is just as much room for women as there is for men in the tech space. We have seen some amazing women making groundbreaking technological innovations including Juliet Ehimuan of Google Africa, Abisoye Ajayi-Akinfolarin of Pearls Africa Foundation, Amrote Abdella of Microsoft for Africa and Nunu Ntshingila of Facebook South Africa.

It is essential for investors to fund teams that integrate women, investing and creating new opportunities for them. In addition, we should seek to eradicate the culture where women don’t participate in technology businesses. Parents and teachers should encourage their girl children to venture into the ever-evolving world of technology.