Bridging the Gender Digital Divide:Challenges in Access and Utilization of ICTs for Development at the Devolved Level in Kenya

This study is an attempt to understand the challenges in access and utilization of ICTs across gender in rural Kenya. Technology is an engine for economic growth.  Strong links have been made between use of specific technologies and growth. Failure to give priority to ICT strategies that enable developing countries to develop their national infrastructures will exacerbate the gap between rich and poor. This study is pegged on the premise that improving women’s access to technology has the potential to spur their economic advancement and stimulate broader economic growth. Regrettably, technology has been underused in unlocking women’s economic opportunities in Kenya. Real access to technology is one of the key elements necessary for integrating technology into society. The key issue here is whether the technology in question is available, physically accessible and affordable. An acute lack of infrastructure in Kenya seriously limits opportunities for using ICTs for economic and social development. Women have less income, education, time, mobility, and face religious and cultural constraints that restrict their access to, and use of, technology. Rural women are more disadvantaged than younger, more literate or wealthier urban women. Women are poorly placed to benefit from the knowledge economy because they have less access to scientific and technical education, and less access to skills training and development. Barriers to universal access are not only about the availability of telecommunications infrastructure and computing equipment, but also barriers to individual access, which may be educational and socio-cultural. The potential to advance women economically may be the most exciting transformative feature of technology.  Empowering women and improving the efficiency of their work is critical for reducing poverty. Mounting evidence confirms that women’s improved economic status produces many positive economic and welfare outcomes for children, families, and societies. Through a comprehensive desk review of the literature available on ICTs access and utilization globally, in Africa and narrowing down to the Kenyan case, this study advances an argument that African women, long deprived of information, education and training can look to advances in information technology to bring learning to their doorsteps. It further argues that Kenyan women cannot be left behind and more so the ones in the rural areas. Technologies, particularly those in the global ICT revolution, give women many opportunities for economic advancement. But without the skills to use the technologies, women can remain on the lowest levels of the economic ladder. Kenya has a Devolved system of Government at the County level that is still in its infancy. This study posits that if the Devolved Governments in Kenya can put appropriate structures and policies in place to capture the digital explosion and attempt to bridge the gender digital divide, then ICTs can promote women’s economic advancement by improving the productivity and quality of women’s work and generating new employment opportunities. In a nutshell, Kenya’s County Governments are progressively emerging as the new platforms for devolving digital opportunities for inclusion for all.