Rural BPOs are investing in inclusize and accountable companies for sustainable development in India. This has greatly helped in creating meaningful opportunities that create better and sustainable lives. Even though the focus is on providing high quality outsourced solutions to the clients, the companies also work towards larger social scenarios and thereby creating a positive socio-economic impact.

Some Rural BPOs have laid out programmes that specifically focus on women empowerment. This is because some women may not have the opportunities to move to cities compared to the men. Some Rural BPOs also focus on the disadvantaged individuals in the community, the minorities and the people with disabilities.

Every year on the 15th of October, the United Nations calls on all of us to celebrate the international day of rural women. Can the roads be equal for everybody where everyone gets the opportunity to be leaders accompanied with similar benefits?

By digitizing villages, rural women and girls can expand their horizons and connect with the rest of the world. The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals present an opportunity for business-led solutions and technologies to be developed and implemented to address the world's biggest sustainable development challenges.

I thought of how a digital village can look like. Listed are the resources that need to be present to digitize a village to benefit rural women.

Gender inequality persists worldwide, depriving women and girls of their basic rights and opportunities. We know that women and girls are a powerful force for change since many of them are well educated and should be rewarded based on merit.

We need to create an environment where women feel it is through their merit that they have risen. When we uplift women and girls, we can break the cycle of poverty. We can help them delay their marriages, choose the timing and spacing of their pregnancies, access needed services and information, complete their education, and gain the knowledge and skills they need to participate in the global economy and in their country's development. 

The following pie chart illustrates the comparison between internet users in Urban India and Rural India based on gender.

Source

There are opportunities for all of us to reflect upon the gains we have made and envision ways in which we can further work towards  the entrenchment of sustainable development goal number 5 of gender equality within our organizations and companies.

We have the opportunity to make the world more stable, secure and resilient. Rural women need to be economically empowered by creating formal employment in their villages. Digitizing the villages is one way that can create opportunities for them. Companies should be building issues of gender into their work-plans and supply chains.

Women should not just be treated as consumers of products and services but as part of the workforce. Women are symbols of hope and can contribute to thriving economies. Rural women can make extraordinary transformational change not just a dream but a reality. When we put women and girls at the center of development, we can see a positive ripple effect across their families, communities and nations.

The Author of this article is Susan Rujema. She is a Rwandan citizen who holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in communication and a Master of Science degree in Procurement and Logistics. She is currently a SITA intern with DesiCrew Solutions working on aligning DesiCrew to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. She earlier worked in monitoring and evaluation in Kenya and communications in Rwanda. Her interest lies in entrepreneurship, peace building, gender development, children's advocacy, climate action and human rights.

One of the most valuable resources in today's global village is data. Data can improve learning, help one try new practices and continuously improve their knowledge and skills. Data is a community asset to be valued and shared to enhance data-driven decision-making. The use of big data and analytics has expanded to rural areas through Business Processing Outsourcing (BPO) companies that have set up rural centers. This trend is common in India where achieving extreme cost benefits has been the underlying force driving businesses to set up BPOs in rural India.

Rural BPOs are commited to delivering business value to a wider range of clients and at the same time transform the rural ecosystem to sustain non-agricultural jobs. This contributes greatly in building smart communities within rural India where the BPOs have set up base because most of them hire employees residing in nearby villages. Such ventures can improve the ability of the community and its members to compete in today's world since the employees get to interact with customers from across the globe.

Data science and data analytics are at the core of every modern globalized industry. Working in today's technology-centric workforce not only requires superior leadership skills, but the ability to translate data problems into the bigger picture for the organization. Companies are today using big data for consumer profiling, personalized services and predictive analysis to optimize sales. 

This technique can be applied to gather information about people's wellbeing  as well. This is very exciting but at the same time, there is the challenge of privacy and potential abuses of data. Legal frameworks in many countries have not yet caught up with the exponential potential of advanced technology. With information shooting from different corners, we are required to find the most reliable sources by validating data to enhance its credibility. Companies need to invest in data security in order to curb unauthorized access to confidential information and at the same time, prevent data corruption.

 On September 25, 2015 world leaders gathered at the United Nations in New York to adopt the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), a truly universal, and transformative global development agenda. Countries need to have high quality disaggregated data for policy making and for monitoring the progress of implementation of the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals.

The role of corporates by and large has been understood in terms of a commercial business but that narrative is changing. To achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, we require the efforts of everybody including the pulling together of resources by governments, businesses and civil society.

Data can be disaggregated by sex, age, geography, income, race, ethnicity, migratory status, disability and other characteristics relevant in national contexts of different countries. When data is disaggregated, the analysis can account for the most vulnerable and marginalized populations and enhance measurements of discrimination and inequalities both within and among contries.

Big Data for development is about turning imperfect, complex, often unstructured data into actionable information. This implies leveraging advanced computational tools (such as machine learning), which have developed in other fields, to reveal trends and correlations within and across large data sets that would otherwise remain undiscovered. Above all, it requires human expertise and perspectives to create data driven policies, businesses and cultures for a better future.