We should also follow suit for a progressive future
KARACHI: Women in the country were initially taught to play the traditional role of being housewives. However, with changing times, the Pakistani society has also evolved. Women have a significant role to play in the society rather than serving at home.
They now form a relatively greater part of Pakistan’s working population and their contribution to the country’s economy has been increasing. The mindset of the people in the rural areas is also changing, there is greater awareness regarding the importance of education for both boys and girls, resulting in an increase in the enrollment of lower income class girls in primary and secondary schools. Many of the women belonging to the middle-class families have now started acquiring higher education. The trend of getting girls married as soon as they enter their 20s is slowly diminishing as well, even if it’s because today’s men want to marry women with a substantial level of education.
Women in Pakistan play a major role in their children’s upbringing. Now that many are literate they can teach their children the values and etiquettes of life. Not only that, women can now teach their own children at home, instead of excessively spending on tuitions after school.
Although there is greater acceptability of women in Pakistan’s society, they are still victims of discrimination. The gender stereotypes which have existed in the society for years still continue to be a barrier for women’s progress in the country. There is a mountain of data that correlates investments in women to poverty reduction, even to a decrease in corruption. We have to pay attention to the hard data and what it tells us, which is to invest in women and provide them with opportunities to fully participate in their societies.
We should set up this agenda and ensure its implementation. And for this, to be able to reach out to more women, we have to be more creative. One of the challenges is to bring new tools to the table, one’s that do a better job enhancing economic progress. Microcredit is one of the great financial tools, but we need broader financial inclusion: savings and other ways that women can be insured against cataclysms of one kind or another. Financial tools can bring creative solutions for investment, as can technology.
I personally think that mobile technology has the potential to be as transformative as microcredit has been. Cellphones are more accessible to women, irrespective of the social class. Its applications are being developed to help improve health care, among other things. In many developed nations, cellphones are being used for banking, teaching literacy, safeguarding women from violence and creating economic opportunities. We should also follow suit for a progressive future.
Saba Muhammad Saleem
Published in The Express Tribune, May 16th, 2017.
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