European rural environments have to deal with three major challenges: - Low economic diversification - loss of the weight of agriculture as an activity; - High rates of unemployment - especially among young people and women; and - Depopulation and ageing of the population. These three trends are leading rural areas to a disadvantage, with a severe negative effect on those who choose to remain in them. Women from rural areas still being the collective more vulnerable due to the following factors: a) They have higher unemployment rates (11,4% - EUROSTAT 2018); b) The activity and employment rates of women remain lower than those for men and the difference in employment rates between men and women is about 13% (Employment indicators 2020 - EU) c) Traditionally there are still taking care of tasks (housekeeping, family, help on family farms, etc.) that are still considered informal. On the other hand, rural areas do offer opportunities for women collective. The social needs can promote the creation of new jobs in occupations that previously were considered “informal occupations”. So, entrepreneurship can be an opportunity not only to deal with the employment gap but also to empower rural females enhancing their employability. The digital transformation offers immense opportunities for economies and societies. However, the benefits of the digital transformation are currently not equally balanced between societal groups and genders and access, use and ownership of digital tools are not gender-neutral. Therefore, it is of utmost importance to foster women’s acquisition of digital skills to enable their participation in today’s digital society on an equal basis, as digital technologies can significantly improve women’s capabilities to join the labour market and carry out actions of entrepreneurship. However, risk aversion, scarce access to seed funding, and rigid social and economic structures which limit the accumulation of funds can jeopardise entrepreneurship propensity of individuals. Considering the above described situation, seven organisations from six different European countries and coordinated by AFAMMER (ES) gathered to launch the BRIDGING THE GAP initiative. BRIDGING THE GAP was aimed to develop new digital knowledge, skills and competences for women in rural areas in order to increase their entrepreneurial, employability and employment opportunities, at the same time fighting the gender digital divide. To achieve this aim, Bridging the Gap partnership implemented a set of activities to build a learning and training area that promote digital skills and competences of rural women. During the last 2 years, the partners organization have been working on: - Definition of a training path for the empowerment of rural women through the development of ICT skills for entrepreneurship. - Identification of the different actors in the training process, providing them with a clear pedagogical approach. - Creation an intervention framework for the training where all the agents involved participate and collaborate. - Building an online platform that allows and ensures the training process. As a result, the project developed the two main outputs: Bridging the Gap competence framework – A comprehensive framework of skills, knowledge and attitudes, tailored to rural females, including the key digital competences that support their employability and entrepreneurship in the new area. Bridging the gap MOOC – A ICT based learning and training environment for rural female entrepreneurs (women from rural areas who accept challenging roles to meet their personal needs and become economically self-sufficient), to upskill rural women, promoting their employability and entrepreneurial mindset, and contributing to fighting the gender digital divide. Itcontains a course of 6 modules all of them addressed to develop ICT competences. Final users also can find some areas to collaborate and learn more about ICT competences, rural entrepreneurship, and equal opportunities. The MOOC Bridging the Gap is available as an Open Educative Resource on the following link: http://bridgingtheruralgap.eu
The project BRIDGING THE GAP main objective was to develop new digital knowledge, skills and competences for women in rural areas in order to increase their entrepreneurial, employability and employment opportunities, at the same time fighting the gender digital divide. Based on this main objective, the following operational objectives are defined: - To define a training path for the empowerment of rural women through the development of ICT skills for entrepreneurship. - To identify the different actors in the training process and provide them with a clear pedagogical approach. - To create an intervention framework for the training where all the agents involved participate and collaborate. - To build an online platform that allows and ensure the training process. This intervention structure reponds and acts on the following strategic objectives: * Developing the ICTs competencies of rural women entrepreneurs. * Bringing ICT training closer to the target group, enabling their empowerment and contributing to fighting the gender digital divide * Fostering rural women's employability through ICT skills development.
European rural environments must deal with three major challenges - Low economic diversification - High rates of unemployment and - Depopulation. These three trends are leading rural areas to a disadvantage, with a severe negative effect on those who choose to remain in them. Women from rural areas still being the collective more vulnerable: a) Higher unemployment rates (11,4%/ EUROSTAT 2018); b) The activity and employment rates of women remain lower than those for men and the difference in employment rates between men and women is about 13% (Employment indicators 2020 - EU) c) Traditionally there are still taking care of tasks (housekeeping, family, help on family farms, etc.) considered informal. The social needs can promote the creation of new jobs in occupations. So, entrepreneurship is an opportunity not only to deal with the employment gap but also to empower rural female enhancing their employability. The digital transformation offers immense opportunities for economies and societies. Therefore, it was of utmost importance to foster women’s acquisition of digital skills, as digital technologies can significantly improve women’s capabilities to join the labour market and carry out actions of entrepreneurship.