The Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) has revealed that 1.6 million girls between the ages of six and 17 years did not use any ICT device in the three months preceding Census Night – April to June 2021.

The figure, according to the service translates to 37.8 per cent.

The GSS disclosed this information as the world marks International Girls in ICT Day under the theme “Digital Skills for Life”.

According to GSS, “In five regions – Savanah leads with 66.1%, North East (61.4%), Northern (60.0%), Oti (55.9%) and Upper West (53.5%) – more than half of girls did not use an ICT device in the period.”

The report further disclosed that “Nationally, 175,898 girls of school-going age (4 to 17 years) lived in a household that did not own a functional ICT device.”

GSS observed that Savannah Region (16.7%) has the highest proportion of girls living in households that did not own functional ICT devices, with a figure more than four times the national average of 3.7 per cent, followed by North East (11.6%) and Upper West (9.7%).

“Almost a quarter of a million girls (238,093) girls in this age group lived in households where no adult used an ICT device in the three months before Census Night,” the statement added.

The Service also recorded that 1,823,071 girls did not use the internet within the three-month period representing 44.3 per cent of girls aged 6 to 17 years.

According to GSS, more than half of girls did not access the internet in eight out of the 16 regions i.e. (Savannah (72.0%), North East (67.9%), Oti (65.5%), Northern (65.5%), Upper West (62.2%), Bono East (56.5%), Upper East (54.8%), and Volta (50.5%) regions.

“In the three months preceding Census Night, 85.9 per cent of girls that have never attended school did not use an ICT device, compared to 34.0 per cent of girls currently attending and 27.9 per cent of those that attended school in the past.

“Within the period, 96.5 per cent of girls that have never attended school did not access the internet which is more than twice the percentage of those that attended school in the past (39.8%) or were currently attending (41.5%).”