Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development (APWLD), together with the Government of Fiji, UN Women Asia Pacific Regional Office (UN Women APRO), International Labor Organization (ILO), Fiji Women’s Rights Movement (FWRM) and Korea Women’s Association United (KWAU) held a side event at the 67th Session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) on 7th March, which aimed to discuss and interrogate the realities and the impact of ‘digital transformation’ on women and girls in Asia and the Pacific and to take stock of the situation with regards to gender-based violence in digital spaces and the gendered impact of digitalisation on labour rights of women and girls. 

The side event featured Hon. Lynda Tabuya, Minister for Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation, Government of Fiji; Nalini Singh, Executive Director, Fiji Women’s Rights Movement; Ms. Melissa Alvarado, Ending VAW Programme Manager, UN Women Regional Office for Asia Pacific; Ms. Kyungjin Oh, Executive Director, Korea Women’s Associations United (KWAU); and Ms. Uma Rani Amara, Senior Economist, Research Unit, International Labor Organization (ILO). The discussion was moderated by Misun Woo, Regional Coordinator, Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development (APWLD).

Speakers at the side event highlighted that though technology provides great opportunities and has the potential to improve social and economic outcomes for all, it also poses the risk of perpetuating existing patterns of discrimination and violation and exacerbating the existing inequalities. 

Hon. Lynda Tabuya, Minister for Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation, Government of Fiji, highlighted that Pacific region especially Fiji has made substantial improvements in ensuring the access to technology and services to women and girls but she emphasised the need to invest in inclusive, just, gender-transformative and climate sustainable technology and innovations. She reiterated that technologies will not fix the root causes and underlying structural problems that continue to drive inequalities and violate women’s rights in society.

“The 21st century workplace requires that nearly everyone has the digital skills however, Fijian parents and teachers reinforce cultural beliefs that science, technology, engineering and mathematics education are masculine and falsely implies that girls are innately inferior in these fields.” – Hon. Lynda Tabuya, Minister for Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation, Government of Fiji.

Ms. Nalini Singh, Executive Director, FWRM, highlighted that during the Asia Pacific CSO Forum on CSW67 and the Pacific Preparatory Processes which took place prior the CSW67 Session on the priority theme, many women’s rights activists and civil society groups highlighted the risk posed by technological advancement and its impact on women and girls. She emphasised that the digital divide among the Global South and North also needs to be addressed as the technologies are being designed in Global North but highly used by Global South. The disparity between women’s participation in the digital spaces has also led to exacerbated inequalities. 

Ms. Melissa Alvarado, Ending VAW Programme Manager, UN Women Regional Office for Asia Pacific, noted that online violence is surging and it is a global pandemic. It exacerbated further during the COVID-19 pandemic during which online platforms were highly utilised. The online violence has high consequences from harming reputation to sometimes leading to death by suicide or even honour-based killing. She called for a survivor-based approach to address technology-facilitated gender based violence that reflects the need of survivors and should be reflected in laws and policies, in prevention and response. She called for grounding all of the work in the experience of survivors and designing a survivor-based approach to ensure a safer platform and safer solution to onlive gender-based violence. 

Ms. Kyungjin Oh, Executive Director, Korea Women’s Associations United (KWAU) shared the realities at the ground and how in South Korea, online gender based violence is on rise and how women rights activists are working to address. She noted that online violence is a global problem and should be addressed by collective action through global movement and solidarity. 

Ms. Uma Rani Amara, Senior Economist, Research Unit, ILO addressed the impact of digitalisation on women’s labour rights. She noted that women continue to face similar challenges and barriers in the digital market as in the traditional market: access to jobs, wage differences, lack of social protection etc. In Asia Pacific, 1 in 4 women are engaged in online labor which is the lowest compared to other regions; despite the large proportion of labor coming from the region and women having the highest education attainment in the region. She also noted that there is gender disparity in Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education and participation of women in the digital market and this will not be resolved unless and until existing patriarchal and social norms are transformed and the root causes are addressed. 

“We need to address many of the gender gaps that are there in digital technology and how to ensure that anti-discrimination rights are developed for workers on online platforms so that they are protected.” – Uma Rani, ILO