According to the study by the national planning commision, the contribution of women to the country's economy is about 41 percent. The study suggests that if given equal opportunities, the income of nepali women can increase by 14-46 percent and they can contribute a lot more to the economy. That calls for more investment on development of women's technical skills. In Nepal only 19 percent of women have access to the internet. But women who excel in technology have done wonderful things.
Late 1980s there was a drive for information system industry in India. IIT Kanpur used to be a leader in driving this industry. Professor Rajaraman taught us (1970) in our class and used to tell us about the potential in the class 1970. Thus was the driving force for me . After working for three years in a software related research project after graduation I came back to Nepal. My higher degree from De Montfort University from the UK added value in my effort. One year in Philips Holland in 1985 in a software project of the telecommunications industry gave me a good background too.
I opted to join IOE, Pulchowk because I wanted to create a large scale work force in the IT sector in nepal. In 1996 and 1997 I was on the executive committee of the Computer Association of Nepal (CAN). I took the president, Mr, Vijaya Krishna Shrestha of CAN and Nepal government representative Chiranjeevi Nepal to Hannover Germany in the CeBIT International fair at Hannover, Germany. I briefed them on how Indian ambassadors are performing in lobbying the industry for outsourcing IT projects. Among one million visitors in CeBIT 1996,1997 and 1999 I persuaded the Nepal government to follow the model of India in generating quality manpower. I even took help from FNCCI. Mr. Padma Jyoti used to be the president of FNCCI then and was also a graduate of IIT Kanpur who was fully aware of the growing scope of IT industry. I mobilized students of IOE and Pokhara University and. I struggled with the right curriculum. The implementation was hard because of lack of resources. The volume of manpower demanded in CeBIT, Hannover was in large volume.No graduate degree existed in Nepal in this sector then. IOE started electronic engineering in 1994. I had an opportunity to convert these students into the IT stream. The Computer Engineering degree was started in 1998 after I submitted a report about the Hannover International fair with a lot of resource constraints.
Accelerating STEM program
We should prepare the girls and women to see not just what technology can do for them but what they can do for technology. STEM is an acronym for Science, Technology, Engineering, and math. These four fields share an emphasis on innovation, problem-solving, and critical thinking. Together they make up a popular and fast-growing industry.
Ensuring students have access to a quality STEM education is essential for keeping Nepal competitive in the local as well as global market. Students should be actively encouraged to study STEM through statewide initiatives. Schools also should offer incentives to students especially girls studying STEM through scholarships and partnerships with cities and states including private sectors. Computational thinking and computational making should be part of literacy in the 21st century now.
Girls and women are systematically tracked away from science and math throughout their education, limiting their access, preparation and opportunities to go into these fields as adults.Women are Underrepresented in STEM Workforce By the time students reach college, women are significantly underrepresented in STEM majors. With global demand special emphasis has to be on the generation of female cyber security experts.
The growth of the academic institutions and IT industry in Nepal should change the perception of the whole world about Nepal's storehouse of knowledge and skills and powered economic growth. In the present time, when the COVID-19 pandemic has grappled the whole world and economies have been hard hit, the IT industry is still showing positive signs and has the ability to overcome this exceptional catastrophe. It has arisen as a global economic force and a major contributor to the Nepalese economy in particular and the world in general.
The rollout of fifth-generation (5G) communication technology, growing adoption of artificial intelligence, Big Data analytics, cloud computing and the Internet of Things (IoT) will further expand the size of the IT industry in the world. Nepal needs quality communication infrastructure and cheaper energy sources led by professional regulators in order to tap this global opportunity.
There should be IT companies growing in other small cities of Nepal which will further enhance the growth and reduce the existing disparities. THese companies should be the ambassadors in promoting STEM in rural homes, especially among rural girls. There should be national strategies to generate a large scale pool of Nepalese skilled human resources which will make the country a global IT hub. The IT Industry has been instrumental in transforming the whole world economic and governance landscape. Nepal’s IT industry should try to gain footsteps in new disruptive technologies and should play a good role in the ongoing fourth industrial revolution globally. For this to happen Nepal government has to engage expert Think Tanks including concerned stakeholders supported by adequate budget. Any investment in this sector the returns are high.
The Nepal government should initiate a transformation process in the education sector. The world trend is now to have the last year of a degree course as an R & D year and the syllabus will be developed based on the latest technological advancements, skills and knowledge. This will surely add value to our graduates not just as job seekers however will be job creators. Sound political system with long-term vision about the development of the country, and a solid framework of governance, rule of law and functioning institutions are the prerequisites for inclusive development of a country supported by competent human capital infrastructure and girls and women specially from rural areas should play key roles in building national resources infrastructure.
We need “Feminist Technology” as “Technological Innovations" that would enhance women’s lives through women’s agenda to make them equal and help increase women’s access to and control of technology, and help grassroots organizations use technology to advance women’s and girls’ human rights. Technology needs to be strategically evaluated by examining its impact on the lives of women, regardless of the inventor’s gender.
Stakeholders engagement
We need women in tech are absolutely the computer scientists and engineers and policymakers entrepreneurs and the journalists and the researchers and at every level we need more of us because we need diversity of thought and diversity of backgrounds to make good tech and good regulation for tech and that is why I think we must do better at making the world of tech as diverse as the societies we live in.
How do we make better use of data without compromising on people's privacy? How do we have free and open conversations online but clean of hate and information. How do we make it easier for the brightest minds in clean tech to help us solve climate change and then. When everything is online how do we keep it safe? How do we keep our infrastructure, our elections, our democracy safe and secure?
A determined government led by a good ecosystem , a strong private sector, academia, researchers, effective NGOs and vibrant media should be promoted during women's international day. Political will and leadership is critical for generating sustained action for gender equality and empowerment of women and girls. Such digitally encouraged and empowered people should be working towards empowering people to gain access to better healthcare, education, skills and livelihood opportunities through digital literacy and digital tools. National Women Commission(Nepal), Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) groups, Girls in IT (GIT), Mathematical Science Associations, Women's wing of Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FNCCI), Confederation of Nepalese Industries (CNI), Women’s wing of Nepal's Chamber of Commerce, Women in Science and Technology (WIST), Women in Information Technology (WIIT) , Women Agency Research Nepal(WARN), Dharma Heera Memorial Academy(DHMA), NGOs, INGOS etc should be jointly promoting the agendas. More NGOs in Women in Tech are growing. These activities will also help in accelerating the Digital Framework Program of Nepal in the areas of Urban Infrastructure Agriculture, Health, Education, Energy, Tourism, and Finance.
AI commission
Artificial Intelligence and gender equality are not related , they are actually intimately intertwined. The problem is representation to ensure fair, equal, and democratic Artificial Intelligence. Until AI systems reflect our society in all its diversity, AI will cause more problems than it solves. Nepal has a Privacy Act, however, not implemented well due to lack of well documented law. Data Driven Innovations, Ecosystem, policy regulatory environment, Integration of heterogeneous data across domains is required. Is the Nepal government ready for this? Without inclusive representation, biased data sets used to train algorithms perpetuates stereotypes about gender. Unless we incentivize representation in all sectors to increase diversity of the AI workforce, design bias will continue to reproduce these gender stereotypes, as well as stereotypes about others not represented in the AI workforce. An AI commission should be created to propose an AI act. which will work towards minimizing the risk of bias and discrimination.
Constitutional rights
Citizens must be familiar with various constitutional rights, right to equality, right to freedom of expression etc. Women in decision making places are given 33% proportional representation, however, women lack resources and experiences to cash opportunities. There are many fundamental rights guaranteed by the constitution trying to put everyone on equal footing. Everyone is equal to hold their own opinion on any issues we should decide what they want to decide. Citizens should decide what they have to decide on their own without any influence without any control and take a decision based on their benefit. In the process of taking a decision whether technology can play a role or not that's what is important.
Good number of people are denied access to technology leading to prevention or inability to access more Information and services. There’s a significant difference between the gender gap and the digital gap. All the people particularly those who are deprived people or marginalised people or disadvantaged people can gain confidence and gain the information through which they can make a decision. They can take a decision which is called empowerment.
Empowering women is about ensuring that they can participate fully in social, economic and political life. Most of them are not able to get more information or not able to connect to any service. The issue is not restricted only to technological access but must be that has its own ramification in their own personal life related to their decision within the family within their community level to participate in a society or able to control their economic facilities want to be part of the political life not necessarily being a member of any bodies at least to exercise the power of the choice or to express opinion in favour of group.
The effect of empowerment has numerous impacts on women's life through policy decisions or intervention through various social institutions . Benefits of empowerment include being free from violence they have control over the sexual and reproductive rights. Their voices can be heard expressing their opinion. They can have social and economic mobility. They have the ability to own and control financial assets they have control over their own income. What technology can do , what are the barriers. Women are neglected as passive participants of development. Women have to claim their place as equal partners in the development process . The empowerment must be support these processes include promoting entrepreneurship among the woman as well as helping them leverage benefits Taking the benefits of ICT they should have a better literacy skills after literacy skills they should have a competency and skills of accessing minimum level of technological resources through which they should be able to access relevant required information or relevant required services.
UN Sustainable development goal
Gender equality is not only a fundamental human right, but a necessary foundation for a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable world. Providing women and girls with equal access to education, health care, decent work, and representation in political and economic decision-making processes will fuel sustainable economies and benefit societies and humanity at large.
The UN has defined 9 Targets and 14 Indicators for SDG 5. Targets specify the goals and Indicators represent the metrics by which the world aims to track whether these Targets are achieved. Below we quote the original text of all Targets and show the data on the agreed Indicators. Indicator 5.1.1 is whether or not legal frameworks are in place to promote, enforce and monitor equality and non-discrimination on the basis of sex.
There are various legal frameworks which can be applied to promote and enforce non-discrimination on the basis of sex. This is assessed here in the SDG Tracker – see also the 'additional charts' – across various measures, including hiring, equal pay, marital rape and property rights, among others. This requires legal frameworks in place to enforce gender equality supported by ICT tools.
Example
Technologies such as blockchain can empower women as it provides them with decision-making power in households, and we see them investing more in food, education and healthcare and entrepreneurial efforts. Building Blocks is a collection of blockchain hubs – computer servers independently operated by each participating organization. Together, they connect and allow humanitarian organizations a neutral space to coordinate the delivery of assistance, so they can meet the full needs of each person at the same time.This network is neutral in that all member organizations are 100 percent equal co-owners, co-operators, and co-governors of the network and all members play an equal role in its upkeep.
Break Biases
The policy of the ministry of education and other concerned lion ministries of Nepal is not aligned with the requirements of the IT industry. I am globally connected with my fast students through LinkedIn, Instagram, Tweeter, Facebook, email etc. I have taught in the premier institute of Nepal for 35 years in the Electronics and Computer engineering department. Lot of my past students are doing very well worldwide and are the owners of software companies providing employment locally and abroad. Some are competent consultants too. These successful talents of Nepal from this industry abroad are contacting me and seeking help because they love Nepal and want to settle back providing job opportunities for Nepalese youth. The bottleneck is the lack of cost effective high quality well regulated physical infrastructure products and volume of talented skilled manpower (human capital) which needs to be sorted out by Nepal government and private sectors. Outsourcing companies are growing, led by brave enterprising owners. They need to be facilitated by the government for tapping the global opportunities for large scale employment of local youth. This is the industry which can feed Nepal. For the growth women leaders are essential who are good at sustaining the industry and the sustainable society.
Experience: Combination of policy makers , innovator, entrepreneur, and social activist
More than 40 years in ICT
Professor Timila Yami Thapa was educated in Indian Institute of Technology ( B. Tech. Electronic Engineering( 1975 batch), Kanpur, India and M.Sc. from De Montfort University, Leicestershire, UK 1995 in Information Technology with specialization in Systems Engineering. She also underwent one year of training on Systems and Communication Infrastructure at Philips, Holland sponsored by UNDP. Her service to Nepal is a unique combination of a national-level policy planner, a pioneering educator in Information Technology and Computer Engineering, an industrial administrator, an entrepreneur and a social reformer working for upliftment of women, child-education and youth employment. She pioneered and initiated new educational programs in Nepal. Her efforts to improve technological infrastructure culminated in the first ever Computer Engineering program in the history of Nepal at Institute of Engineering under Tribhuvan University, which became the foundation of current growth in engineering and technology in Nepal.
Pioneering Contribution in ICT sector
Story
Considering the political situation and the state of education in 1979, it required significant effort and persuasion of higher administration and ministers to invest in the technological future of Nepal. As a national-level policy planner, I worked for one year as a Member of the ICT Advisory Board under the Prime-minister's office. As an educational policy planner, I served as a member of the Academic council and the Research Council under University Grant Commission, Nepal. I also worked as a governing member of the Nepal Engineering Council for three years. I also served for three years as a member of the advisory board member of Rural Telecommunication Fund Board, Nepal Telecommunication Authority (NTA). From 1996-08, I was also in charge of looking after promoting the software industry in the Computer Association of Nepal (CAN) where I worked as an executive board member (1996- 1998 ). I am currently also serving as an Immediate Past President, IETE ( Institute of Electronics and Telecommunication Engineers, India), Nepal chapter.
As an educator, I served in the Engineering faculty, Institute of Engineering (IOE) of Tribhuvan University, Nepal, since 1979 until my retirement (2015) first as a professor in the Electronics and Computer Engineering Department; and later as the Assistant Dean when I managed four state-owned and ten affiliated Engineering colleges. I taught Electronic Engineering courses from 1979 till 1997 and Computer Engineering courses in that department from 1998 till 2015 at Institute of Engineering IOE, under Tribhuvan University. I also worked in Pokhara university for four years designing course-curriculum of BE Software Engineering, Computer Engineering, BCA, BE in Information Technology. I also served as a senate member at Pokhara University. I also worked as a Senate member for two years at Pokhara University.
I am the owner of a Software company Designco Nepal founded in 1991. That time, well-qualified human resources in the IT area were not available and opening a software company was very difficult due to the lack of resources and the domestic market.
I handled complex software projects of Himal Cement, Nepal Electricity Authority, Nepal Telecom, Nepal Water Sewerage Corporations(NWSC) and KUKL, Jyoti Group, etc.
I also initiated the creation of the first IT Park in the history of Nepal organizing a series of interactions with prominent leaders and business people including president of FNCCI. I was a CAN executive committee member then. CAN Infotech exhibition was also organized that also provided more exposure along with the further exposure in the International Software Industry exhibition at Hanover Germany 1996, 1997 and 1999 and I contributed in formulating IT policy and initiating IT park. I also convinced the Education ministry and concerned stakeholders to invest in opening Computer Engineering at IOE.
As a social reformer, I have been actively involved in the social work in child education and women’s empowerment by organizing many activities and participating in many organizations. I founded DHMA in 2011 and currently work as Chairperson to promote ICT, child education, empowerment programs for minority groups, especially women, skill development of youth and services for and child education. in Nepal. I am also engaged in other organizations with the major motto of promoting ICTs extensively for empowerment. I worked as Chairperson of Women Agency Research Nepal (2019- 2022), Life member of Women In IT(WIIT), Executive member of senior Professor’s Association, Executive Member of Senior Citizens Samaj, Nepal. Member of Senior Professional Engineer, CIDC, India. Life member of Management Association Nepal (MAN), Nepal Engineer Association (NEA) and HEADS Nepal, Member of Women in Science and Technology (WIST), Member of Women chapter of Chamber of Commerce, Member of AOTs Japan, Member of Mount Everest Rotary club, Member of Lalitpur Cultural Centre.