parallel session 1 (breakout room 1

of researchers ranging from humanities and social sciences to health sciences embracing qualitative, quantitative, and interdisciplinary studies. The Chair has put forward four areas of interest to conduct gender studies as well as a public engagement agenda for SDGs: (1) violence against women, (2) women employment, (3) political participation, and (4) women in engineering and health sciences. With regard to policy-oriented research and public impact, the Chair collaborates with national, regional, and international stakeholders such as the UN Women, the UNESCO national committee, municipalities, and bar associations. The Chair is also known to provide legislative monitoring projects and develop gender mainstreaming programs for companies to implement gender impact analysis in the decision-making process. The Chair has developed different types of programs for young professionals to foster international collaboration and gender equality and contribute to the promotion of global feminist advocacy. In this regard, the UNESCO Summer School on Women's Empowerment and Sustainable Development organized in 2019 has been regarded as a good practice at the global level.

“In Turkish, there is an old saying and it states that if you drink a cup of coffee with a friendly person it will be remembered for 40 years. We could still do it virtually there and until our meeting face to face, we hope that the experience of the W37 summit is remembered well.”

Dr. Bhavani Rao R., UNESCO Chair on Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment, Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Kerala, India, explained that the vision for the UNESCO Chair has been laid down by the Chancellor of the University, Mata Amritanandamayi Devi, who states that as the two wings of a bird, men and women are of equal value, for without the two in perfect balance, humanity cannot progress. The mission of the Chair, established in 2016, is to increase women's empowerment as an equitable approach towards achieving gender equality through three strong pillars: participatory action research, implementation, and knowledge dissemination. In terms of implementation, the Chair works in 101 rural communities across 21 states in India, providing capacity building by using ICT to teach vocational livelihoods and life skills. The purpose is also to actively engage rural women in cleaning and sustaining the environment, training them on maintaining collective living spaces, water bodies, and also building toilets for themselves through very strong involvement of individual women and women self-help groups so that they have strong economic empowerment and vitality within the communities. So far, 6000+ women and 200+ trainers have been trained in over 60 villages in 19 states, with 30,000+ indirect beneficiaries, with a variety of vocational skills, from basic sewing to plumbing or automotive servicing. Numerous projects have been implemented to improve the resilience of women through the Covid pandemic. Dr. Rao presented the systems-oriented approach that distills this knowledge into a framework which is accelerating women's empowerment through systems-oriented model expansion. She explained that the approach to community engagement is holistic and participatory with a vision towards promoting community development, ownership, and empowerment and is driven based on a behavioral shift for long-run sustenance. She then shared various projects on knowledge dissemination, including workshops, conferences, academic programs, publications, collaborations with foreign and local partner institutions, weekly research colloquium, reports with UNESCO on the status of the role of men in promoting gender equality in India, training of over 7000 paramilitary officers in mental health and in gender sensitization.

“We are looking forward to collaborations at all levels for the holistic empowerment of women be it in economics, environment, society, politics, culture, safety, security, education, skill development, health, or sanitation.”

parallel session 1 (breakout room 1) Moderated by Dr. Joost Monks, Lecturer, University of Geneva 1. Gender dynamics: a case study of role allocation in enGineerinG education Professor Sune Von Solms, University of Johannesburg, South Africa Science and Technology

Highlights The under-representation of women in engineer-

ing remains a problem to this day where women represented 4% of registered professional engineers in South Africa in 2014. The experience of female engineers in industry and female students in engineering courses can play a significant role in their decision to remain in engineering or pursue a different career path. The investigation of gender dynamics in small groups of engineering students, specifically focusing on the participation and role allocation of female students can shed light on the experiences of female students in the engineering education environment. The study shows that, although female engineering students are still in the minority in engineering courses, many are active participants in groups and fulfill leadership roles in those groups. It brought to light the very important matter on the under-representation of women in engineering. The real-time context of the study and the methodology provided insight into the nuances of gendered participation and gender dynamics among male and female engineering students. The study concluded that while there are many programs to get women involved in engineering, there is still progress to be made in the larger social-cultural context that surrounds and affects women.

2. ParWee - Priority action roadmaP for Women's economic emPoWerment in the Wake of covid-19 Sandrine Bonin (Yamuna), Center For Women’s Empowerment And Gender Equality (CWEGE), Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Amritapuri, Kerala, India Finance and Economics

Highlights The study aims to co-create a "Priority Action Roadmap for Women's Economic Empowerment" (PARWEE) based on women entrepreneurs' top priorities, charting response actions and recovery directions in the wake of Covid-19 for their businesses. Doing so contributes to the growing body of knowledge on Covid-19 literature in at least four areas: (i) assessing Covid-19 impacts on women entrepreneurs; (ii) mapping these impacts with four interdependent women's entrepreneurial ecosystem components; (iii) innovating a co-creation methodology based on remote participatory research; and (iv) providing a replicable model to perform action-oriented research in the context of Covid-19 impacts. The work shared on PARWEE was extremely illuminating about the multidimensionality inherent in women’s empowerment and entrepreneurship studies; it highlighted the complexities around women belonging to formal and informal institutions. The methodology shared was also highly intricate and comprehensive and provides a template for allowing for the replicability of the “Co-Creation Methodology”. The study served as an application of the Systems Thinking Approach to the study of women’s empowerment.

3. intelliGent assistive devices With community Platform backinG: a socio-economic intervention for Gender-inclusive assistive technoloGy Mr. M Sivasankar and Ms. Resy George Independent Researchers, Independent Finance and Economics

Highlights People with disabilities (PWD) use a set of assistive devices to enable them to lead a normal life; ranging from the humble white cane to the sophisticated electric wheelchair. However, three major limitations are menacingly visible in this sector – (1) technological primitiveness, (2) lack of affordability, and (2) lack of gender inclusiveness. Optimally leveraging the disruptive power of technology, incorporating a financial model ensuring affordability, and ensuring gender-inclusive social platform backing could make a world of difference. The target of the project is to make the existing stack of assistive devices into agile companions for enabling people with disabilities (gender inclusively) to lead a dignified life, in an affordable manner. Intelligent Assistive Device (iAD) is a newly constructed concept aimed at making the existing stack of assistive devices into agile companions for PWD. A well-conceived and implemented iAD rollout strategy would also build an active community of care providers including doctors, counselors, physiotherapists, and companion- caregivers. The community could evolve into an effective interactive social network addressing various challenges related to dignified living and active societal engagement. Above all, a financial model addressing the key issue of affordability is a vital element of the project. The project brought visibility to key

challenges around assistive technology that have made it difficult for them to be inclusive: technological primitiveness, affordability, lack of focus on gender inclusiveness. The vast majority of disabled in Kerala and India are women. Due to the multi-dimensionality of the problem a comprehensive solution is needed. The study also looks at devising intelligent assistive devices to precisely tackle the challenges highlighted with respect to assistive devices and Persons with Disabilities.

4. reboot and recovery: solutions for challenGes faced by small Women-led businesses, Post-Pandemic Vani Sharma Managing Partner, TransNational Training Solutions Finance and Economics

Highlights For a woman building one’s own business often remains a dream. Unconscious biases, low confidence in skills, blocked access to finance and networks, lack of family support, low focus on technology and digitization, poor marketing lead to slow success and abandonment. Women still make attempts. For most women entrepreneurs though, Covid has been back-breaking. The presentation focuses on innovative solutions that can repair the conduits. The study explores the Indian Government’s Schemes, indigenous networking platforms, resource mobilization techniques, market dynamics, and keys to our complex regulatory environment, in a post Covid scenario, which can be the game-changer for strapped businesses. Across the spectrum, challenges, stereotypes, nuances around women’s empowerment and vulnerabilities, are universal. Reboot and Recovery is a project that is trying to find solutions to challenges that women-owned businesses face.

5. Gender-friendly tools and equiPment in farm mechanization Suresh A Assistant Professor, Department of Management, Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Kollam, Kerala Science and Technology Agriculture is the traditional livelihood source of most of the rural women and drudgery of farm tools is still an issue. A major drudgery-producing factor is the usage of un-ergonomic tools and types of equipment by farm women. Farm women can be empowered in mechanized agriculture through capacity-building training and continuous handholding. Power-operated machinery and ergonomically designed tools and implements reduce the drudgery of farm operations and increase the physical well-being of the women's farm labour force. However, the adoption of farm technologies is found to be less among farm women, due not only to the technology itself but also due to several socio-cultural and economic reasons. Mechanization of agricultural operations on a farm reduces the drudgery involved, increases timeliness and efficiency of work, and increases profit. Gender Friendly Mechanization including the introduction of gender-friendly equipment and farm tools help to reduce drudgery and emphasize safety and comfort to the woman worker. Innumerable studies carried out in the ergonomic evaluation of machinery have indicated that the work performance output of women farmworkers improves when ergonomically suitable machinery is introduced among them. It was clear that the improved tools with better ergonomic design could reduce the drudgery faced by farm women in manual weeding operations and their use is recommended. Traditionally, agriculture is an activity that sees ample participation of women, with women forming 38% of the agricultural workforce in developing countries.

6. an autonomous social robot to Promote ProPer hand hyGiene amonG children in india Gayathri Manikutty, Ph.D. Scholar and Assistant Professor, AMMACHI labs, Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham Science and Technology

Highlights Handwashing with soap is a low-cost and effective method to fight the spread of infectious diseases. However, despite its simplicity and effectiveness, establishing regular hand washing behaviours has been a challenge for several hand washing interventions. Children are especially vulnerable to morbidities such as anemia, diarrhoea, respiratory