New Delhi: March 8 is commemorated as the International Women’s Day (IWD) across the world. The day is dedicated to celebrate cultural, political, and socioeconomic achievements of women. This year, the day is being marked to explore the impact of the digital gender gap on widening economic and social inequalities. Here are the things you need to know about the day:
Theme For International Women’s Day 2023:
Every year, Women’s Day is celebrated with a unique theme. This year, UN’s theme for International Women’s Day is “DigitALL: Innovation and technology for gender equality”. It aims to recognise and celebrate women who are championing the advancement of transformative technology and digital education and highlight the need for gender equality in the world of innovation and technology.
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The Importance Of The Theme
According to International Telecommunication Union, only 63 per cent of women are using the Internet in 2022 compared to 69 per cent of men. 259 million fewer women have access to the Internet than men, even though they account for nearly half the world’s population. As per World Economic Forum, by 2050, 75 per cent of the jobs will be related to STEM areas. Yet today, women hold just 22 percent of the positions in artificial intelligence, to name just one. The 2022 Gender Snapshot Report by United Nations states that a study of 51 countries revealed 38 per cent of the women had personally experienced online violence. The same report also highlights that women’s exclusion from the digital world has shaved $1 trillion from the gross domestic product of low and middle-income countries in the last decade—a loss that will grow to $1.5 trillion by 2025, if no corrective action is taken.
To overcome these challenges, this year International Women’s Day is dedicated to the theme – “DigitALL: Innovation and technology for gender equality.” The aim is to bring together technologists, innovators, entrepreneurs, and gender equality activists to provide an opportunity to highlight the role of all stakeholders in improving access to digital tools. United Nations state that bringing women into technology results in more creative solutions and has greater potential for innovations that meet women’s needs and promote gender equality. Their lack of inclusion, by contrast, comes with massive costs.
History Of The Day
International Women’s Day was celebrated for the first time in 1975 by the United Nations on March 8. Since then, the UN has become the primary sponsor of the annual event and has marked the day with a necessary theme.
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NDTV – Dettol have been working towards a clean and healthy India since 2014 via the Banega Swachh India initiative, which is helmed by Campaign Ambassador Amitabh Bachchan. The campaign aims to highlight the inter-dependency of humans and the environment, and of humans on one another with the focus on One Health, One Planet, One Future – Leaving No One Behind. It stresses on the need to take care of, and consider, everyone’s health in India – especially vulnerable communities – the LGBTQ population, indigenous people, India’s different tribes, ethnic and linguistic minorities, people with disabilities, migrants, geographically remote populations, gender and sexual minorities. In wake of the current COVID-19 pandemic, the need for WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene) is reaffirmed as handwashing is one of the ways to prevent Coronavirus infection and other diseases. The campaign will continue to raise awareness on the same along with focussing on the importance of nutrition and healthcare for women and children, fight malnutrition, mental wellbeing, self care, science and health, adolescent health & gender awareness. Along with the health of people, the campaign has realised the need to also take care of the health of the eco-system. Our environment is fragile due to human activity, which is not only over-exploiting available resources, but also generating immense pollution as a result of using and extracting those resources. The imbalance has also led to immense biodiversity loss that has caused one of the biggest threats to human survival – climate change. It has now been described as a “code red for humanity.” The campaign will continue to cover issues like air pollution, waste management, plastic ban, manual scavenging and sanitation workers and menstrual hygiene. Banega Swasth India will also be taking forward the dream of Swasth Bharat, the campaign feels that only a Swachh or clean India where toilets are used and open defecation free (ODF) status achieved as part of the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2014, can eradicate diseases like diahorrea and the country can become a Swasth or healthy India.
