VIEW SPEECH SUMMARY
- Morocco has one of the highest percentages of female engineers worldwide.
- Women in the MENA region, especially in STEM fields, show resilience and can drive societal shifts through technology.
- Speaker founded a blog and later Womenpreneur to empower women technologically.
Gender and AI Bias
- AI reflects existing societal biases, e.g., ChatGPT associating CEOs with men by default.
- Examples such as Amazon’s AI recruitment tool show systemic gender discrimination, selecting predominantly male candidates.
- Medical AI tools often misdiagnose women due to lack of inclusive data; significant female mortality results from this gap.
- Facial recognition AI has failed to correctly identify prominent Black women, revealing racial bias.
- Consumer products, such as phones and shaving razors, are often designed without women's needs in mind, leading to unequal experiences and higher costs for women (pink tax).
Current Challenges and Impact
- 70% of women worldwide live in poverty.
- Women are underrepresented in AI professions, mostly absent from innovative roles.
- Exclusion of women from technology development results in economic loss, misdiagnosis, discriminatory hiring, and inadequate digital services.
- AI amplifies societal inequalities instead of mitigating them.
Call to Action and Solutions
- Support and invest in women-led startups and initiatives focused on women's needs.
- Train and educate women in AI, cybersecurity, and coding to enable them to create and innovate technology.
- Promote ethical AI development and fairness regulation.
- Encourage open discussions questioning biases in technology and society.
- Increase women's participation in AI innovation to create smart, sustainable, and equitable economies.
- Teach young girls critical thinking and coding skills to prepare future generations.
Organizational Work
- Womenpreneur organization, founded in 2016, active in 25 countries, has trained 25,000 women in tech fields.
- Advocates that technology has no gender and empowers women to shape society through tech.
Philosophical Reflection
- Emphasizes the need for collaboration and equality, inspired by titi monkeys who survive through non-hierarchical support, rather than patriarchal models.
- Calls for societies to foster inclusion where all voices are heard, not excluding men but promoting equity.
Actionable Items
- Invest in women-led startups and tech companies focused on female users.
- Regulate AI tools for fairness and ethical standards.
- Train and educate women and girls in STEM, coding, and critical thinking.
- Raise awareness about AI biases and gender discrimination in technology.
- Promote inclusive product design that considers women's needs.
- Foster discussions within organizations on ethical AI and gender inclusion.
- Support initiatives like Womenpreneur that empower women in technology.
Women and AI: Redefining Power, Business, and the Future of Humanity
14:10 - 14:30, 27th of May (Tuesday) 2025 / INSPIRE STAGE
In this thought-provoking speech, Sana explores the intersection of women, artificial intelligence, and the future of power dynamics in business and society. As AI reshapes industries and decision-making structures, she challenges the audience to consider: Who is designing the future? Who holds the power? And where do women stand in this transformation?
Sana highlights the critical role of women in shaping AI-driven economies, addressing both the risks and opportunities that emerging technologies present. She examines how AI is influencing leadership, entrepreneurship, and economic equity, and why it’s crucial to ensure that women are not just consumers of AI but creators, decision-makers, and innovators in this rapidly evolving landscape.