This text was contributed to TechCabal by Charles Mathews
It’s a Saturday morning in Cape City, and in a room, many women and some boys are baking code. The massive problem? To create an e-commerce retailer with a scannable barcode, entrance finish, and the attendant API. The stress is palpable as a result of there are money prizes up for grabs, and these younger folks come from contexts marked by unemployment and poverty.
The occasion was organised by BabesGotBytes, a South African advocacy group that promotes equitable entry to high quality schooling and expertise as inherent rights, fairly than unique privileges. Since 2018, this initiative began by founders Amanda Gxagxa and Phindiwe Nqanqaru has been getting ready women and girls to enter the workforce.
“Amanda Gxagxa and I began BabesGotBytes once we had been college students, and we seen that there was an enormous gender hole within the expertise trade,” says Nqanqaru, in an interview after the Hackathon early in December 2023. “Once we went out to expertise companies and trade meet-ups, we noticed how few girls there are within the trade. We needed to do one thing about this. We needed to get extra women to change into part of the trade.”
“Within the communities that we come from most individuals suppose that expertise is just for males, and we needed to problem and alter this notion. These days, all the things is about expertise and most jobs will likely be generated by the tech trade, so we didn’t need the ladies to be left behind. That is how and why we began,” Nqanqaru says.
The Global Gender Gap Report 2023 authored by the World Financial Discussion board reveals that solely three African nations rank within the examine’s prime 20 this yr. They’re Namibia, which pleasingly now has closed 80% of its nationwide gender hole; Rwanda, which can be doing properly on this regard; and South Africa, which has dropped within the rankings since 2010 when it was in 10th place.
“Progress in direction of the achievement of gender equality in South Africa has been very sluggish,” writes gender activist, Nozi Mjoli. “Hundreds of thousands of girls proceed to be essentially the most deprived members of society in South Africa attributable to poverty and lack of expertise.”
Nqanqaru’s origin story reveals the company that entry to expertise affords women and girls. “Coding has revealed my superpowers,” she says. “At first, I didn’t know something about expertise or computer systems. I needed to construct a profession that was strong however didn’t know what to do.”
Born in a small Japanese Cape city referred to as Elliot, the coder matriculated from highschool with none choices for tertiary schooling. However all the things modified when a buddy requested her to return alongside to a coding programme. This sparked an curiosity that modified the course of Nqanqaru’s life trajectory.
“I used to be a misplaced soul, however after I began coding, I flexed my muscle mass and realised my superpowers. That’s after I realised I needed to go this expertise on as a result of I needed to affect different folks’s lives. I bought so many mentors who believed in me after I didn’t consider in myself. For this reason I needed to do the identical for different women who don’t consider in themselves,” the coder-cum-mentor says.
“What’s thrilling to see is that this primary cohort is now in college or working within the expertise sector,” Nqanqaru says. “2023 was our most efficient yr as a result of we managed to get 5 women into jobs in expertise. We now have gotten 14 of our BabesGotBytes women into the Samsung and UWC Future Innovation Lab & App Manufacturing facility Programme. So, we aren’t simply instructing. What’s necessary is that we get women internships and assist them to review additional so we develop a great pipeline of engineers for this nation and Africa.”
Analysis proves this to be true. The South African SME Tech Index 2023 reveals that the female-owned corporations within the examine had larger enterprise development in comparison with male-owned corporations, indicating a competitiveness and talent to navigate challenges.
Charles Lee Mathews is a former journalist and serial entrepreneur who now works at Thinkroom, Thinkubate and Grindstone Accelerator. Thinkroom, a female-led consulting agency that grows SMEs, founders and entrepreneurial ecosystems, sponsored the prizes for the BabesGotBytes hackathon.
