29 Apr 2019

Women in Technology Organisation (WOTECH) aims to motivate women and girl’s interest in computing, educating themselves to be career driven and to engage in activities and projects that aim to improve the working and learning environments for women.

Speaking at ITU Girls in ICT day and round table discussion, outgoing manager of Women in Technology in Botswana, Ms Tlamelo Melemo said WOTECH is an organisation founded by a group of 10 young women who are pursuing their studies in technology.

She said the event was held to address challenges and come up with solutions to mitigate the problems at hand faced by girls and women in the ICT.

“The objectives of the event among others is to discuss the challenges that are currently faced by women in technology, to inspire young girls to join the industry, create and leverage more opportunities for women within the technology industry, how to position women and girls within the upcoming and rapid growth of the 4th Industrial evolution and to mobilise stakeholders such as government and other communities to support the involvement of women and girls in ICT,” she said.

The expected outcome of the event, according to Melemo was knowledge-sharing by participants and stakeholders, understanding each other’s work and background, enhanced multi-stakeholder interaction, collaboration and partnerships, accelerated alignment in work done by WOTECH Botswana, collaboration and solutions to correct current problem faced by women and girls in ICT.  

In an interview brand & communications manager at Botswana Innovation Hub (BIH) Ms Kemiso Ben said that ICT was one of the priority focal sectors of Botswana Innovation Hub.  

She said BIH was focused on supporting and enabling the development of innovative local digital applications, products and services that help Botswana advance in the technology space.

She explained that BIH acknowledged the underrepresentation of women in IT led projects hence partnered with programmes such as SANBIo-FemBioBiz (Female in Bioscience Businesses) in order to encourage women to participate in large numbers in technology driven businesses.

She opined that WOTECH’s vision in inspiring school girls and young women was in line with BIH’s support of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) activities and noted that BIH collaborated with WOTECH on activities that motivate and inspire girls in ICT

Ms Ben further said BIH and WOTECH would intensify engagement and work on delivering scheduled activities that continue to motivate and inspire young women  and such would include engagement with the media for information dissemination.

She added that the youth could be encouraged to build a generation free of social media abuse by continuous engagement on activities that motivate and inspire young women through mentorship, talks and other activities.

“These should be done at grassroots level and spearheaded by parents, guardians and teachers and the use of social media to build a positive character/brand should also be demonstrated at an early stage so that the young understand responsible use of social media/technology.” ENDS