About 600 girls have been trained under the ‘Girls-in-ICT’ programme, Minister of Communications, Ursula Owusu Ekuful, has revealed.

She said as part of measures to bridge the gender gap existing in the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) sector, Member States of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) adopted in 2012 the celebration of the Girls-in-ICT.

In May 2019, the Ministry celebrated the Girls in ICT in Western region training 600 students drawn from 9 Districts in the region, she added.

Speaking at a press conference in Accra on Monday 14th October, 2019, she said: “We want to make it bigger and better, so we have instituted a biannual celebration and will be training 980 girls drawn from 14 Districts in the Central Region. The training of Trainers has just been completed and the training of the Girls start today. The Mentorship day and Climax Event will be held in Cape Coast on 4th and 5th November 2019, respectively. The next stop for the Girls in ICT after the Central Region will be the newly minted Oti Region in the first quarter of next year.

“We want to stimulate the interest of girls in STEM education and careers, demystify ICT and narrow the gender digital divide and we have just launched the MsGeek Ghana competition which is open to girls of ages 13-25, to excite them to innovate and use technology to solve everyday challenges.

“Submission of entries is open until 10th November and I am using this opportunity to encourage all interested girls and young ladies to apply and hopefully win the attractive prices on offer. The winner of MsGeek Ghana will represent Ghana at the MsGeek Africa competition in Guinea Conakry in March 2020 during the first Transform Africa Summit to be held outside Kigali, Rwanda.”

She added: “We have much more information to give you on the DTT implementation process, The Common Monitoring Platform, Rural Telephony Project, Cyber Security and E Governance initiatives among others but will end here to prevent information overload. I hope to get another slot to continue this interaction in the not too distant future.”