Celebrating International Women’s Day

In a video message celebrating International Women’s Day, Professor Asha Kanwar explained COL‘s role in promoting gender equality in education and training through digital innovation and technology. As an intergovernmental organisation focused on promoting learning for sustainable development through the use of technologies, COL has developed innovations to advance gender equality in education and training. Some examples include the Lifelong Learning for Farmers programme, which uses basic mobile phones to provide short audio lessons in local languages on agriculture and financial literacy to women farmers, leading to empowerment and economic gains.

Additionally, COL’s CommonwealthWiseWomen programme employs a range of technologies, including WhatsApp, to link eminent women with girls in remote regions to provide mentoring and support. However, more is needed to keep women and girls in step with developments in technology, such as generative artificial intelligence and robotics. COL will continue to provide solutions that work in different contexts and promote enabling policies that help women transcend discriminatory barriers, while raising community awareness for supporting girls’ education.