11M women may lose jobs by 2030

Nearly 11 million women in India are at risk of losing their jobs to automation by 2030, says a report. The effect will likely be most pronounced in agriculture and forestry (4 million estimated job losses), craft and related work (3 million), and routine elementary occupations (2 million). But India will also add nearly 23 million jobs for women by then, especially in male - dominated sectors like manufacturing and construction. "transition from farm labour to non - farm jobs is key to prevent more women from dropping out," 

When we do think about it - this makes sense. Despite years of working to open up new careers to women, career choice remains heavily influenced by gender. More men work in manufacturing. More women become teachers. How far you go in your chosen career is impacted by gender too - as our annual Women in the Workplace report consistently shows, there are far fewer women in C - Suite positions than there are men.

A new report , finds that up to 1 in 4 women currently working today will be impacted by automation and artificial intelligence over the next ten years. That's a scary number - its 40 million to 160 million women around the globe. The good news is, we have the insight and the ability to influence the outcome, making what seems like a potential setback into a giant opportunity.

Here are three things to know from the study:

Women face old barriers as well as new ones. As we embrace a world where technology becomes fundamental to career success, it's disturbing to note that around the globe, men are 33 percent more likely than women to have access to the internet. Women often work a double shift in the paid economy and unpaid economy with less time to invest in reskilling. The burden of unpaid care work is roughly 3 times as many hours as men, according to the OECD. Finally, women often lack a basic assurance of safety - in the workplace and in their commutes to and from work. Sadly, safety is a universal challenge in urban and rural areas, developed and developing economies.

But, the best case scenario is pretty good. Just as some opportunities disappear in the future, new occupations will be born. If women capture the opportunities for new job growth, they could move into higher paid, more productive jobs. These jobs are concentrated in the healthcare and social services sectors and those fundamentally oriented around technology such as professional, scientific, and technical services. Existing jobs could also change meaningfully, enabled by technology, allowing women to spend more time on non-routine and potentially more satisfying work. Examples include how the activities of nurses could be reshaped in favour of more time with patients, as some of their more administrative tasks are automated. Additionally, new jobs on the very frontier of technology will be created, such as machine learning.

To reach a solution, the scale of the problem will require cooperation across sectors. Even the largest corporate reskilling programs today reach workers in numbers of thousands, and most are only targeting existing employees. To reach almost 25 percent of the world's female workforce, companies, governments and the private sector will have to work together, leveraging both offline and online channels to reach the women who will be most vulnerable to occupational shifts. 

The future is coming. We now know what the roadmap for a successful transition can look like. Let's not wait till the problem is fully upon us to start supporting women.