Interventions and pathways for South African women in engineering and the built environment professions

Abstract

Women engineers are known to be very resourceful, result-oriented, committed and hardworking. The low participation of women in engineering and the built environment professions has been taking its toll on the economic and infrastructural development of South Africa. The practice of engineering, which is accepted universally to be the bedrock of development of any nation, would have been more profound in South Africa, particularly, in the area of service provision, if women had been encouraged to enter and were retained in engineering and built environment careers. This paper discusses interventions and pathways required for more representation, participation and retention of South African women in the professional practice of engineering and the built environment, for meaningful advancement of the nation technologically and economically.

Keywords:

• economic development
• engineering education
• engineering and the built environment
• entrepreneurial skills
• female gender
• STEM

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Christianah O. Ijagbemi http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5738-1030

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Department of Industrial Engineering, Tshwane University of Technology, Pretoria and the South African Women in Science and Engineering.