EDITORIAL: Why women must be at the centre of Kenya’s tech revolution

In a digital age where artificial intelligence and robotics are reshaping economies, Kenya cannot afford to leave half its population behind.

That is the philosophy driving the African Girls Can Code Initiative, a UN Women Kenya and African Union programme preparing young women for careers in technology—and pushing policymakers to rethink gender gaps in STEM.

The initiative goes beyond coding bootcamps. It creates a pipeline of women skilled in robotics, cybersecurity and digital design, ready to meet the demands of a rapidly changing labour market.

It also aligns with Kenya’s national development priorities, including the Digital Superhighway agenda, by ensuring women are not only consumers of technology but also creators.

For participants, the impact is personal and transformative: a Kisumu ICT student who now runs court networks, a Mombasa coder developing disaster-risk apps for people with disabilities and a Wajir teacher integrating robotics into grassroots education. But their stories also speak to a bigger policy truth—digital inclusion is not charity, it is strategy.

As the African Union pushes Agenda 2063 and Kenya advances its Bottom-Up Economic Transformation Agenda, initiatives like AGCCI show that empowering women in technology is about unlocking economic resilience, innovation and competitiveness. By breaking stereotypes and building digital literacy, these programmes are closing gaps that have long undermined Africa’s growth.

The lesson is clear: if Kenya is to thrive in the fourth industrial revolution, women must be at the centre of its digital policy and practice.

Quote of the Day: “Press forward. Do not stop, do not linger in your journey, but strive for the mark set before you.”  —English-born Methodist leader and preacher George Whitefield died on September 30, 1770