Rapid Growth of Women’s Employment in the ICT Sector: Georgia’s Experience in a Global Context

Over the past few years, gender dynamics in Georgia’s ICT sector have begun to change in ways that are increasingly visible in official data. BTU’s Digital Ecosystem Digest (2025) shows that the growth of women’s employment in ICT professions is no longer slow, marginal, or driven only by isolated success stories. Instead, it has become a systemic trend that is already reshaping the structure of the country’s digital labour market.

In 2022, the number of women employed directly in ICT professions in Georgia stood at around 1.7 thousand. By 2023, this figure had increased to 2.7 thousand, and by 2024 it reached approximately 3.4 thousand women. In practical terms, this means that women’s employment in ICT nearly doubled within just two years. Such a growth rate is unusual for labour-market indicators, especially in technology-intensive sectors, where occupational structures typically change slowly. Importantly, the report explicitly excludes pandemic-era distortions from comparisons, reinforcing the conclusion that this is not a temporary fluctuation but a genuine structural expansion (BTU Digital Ecosystem Digest, 2025).

Alongside the increase in absolute numbers, the share of women in ICT professions has risen sharply. By 2024, women accounted for 29% of all ICT professionals in Georgia—almost one in every three employees. In contrast, in 2022 women represented only 15%, roughly one in six. Achieving such a shift within a short timeframe is rare in technology sectors, particularly in countries where ICT has long been perceived as a male-dominated field. In Georgia’s case, this indicates that women’s participation is moving from the periphery toward becoming a normal and expected feature of the sector (BTU Digital Ecosystem Digest, 2025).

The pattern of growth is especially notable in programming-related occupations. Data show that the number of women employed in programming doubled over a two-year period. This matters not only from a gender-equality perspective, but also from the standpoint of sectoral development. Programming and software development form the technological core of the ICT industry and are closely linked to productivity growth and higher value creation. Women’s increasing presence in these roles suggests that their participation is no longer confined to auxiliary or support functions but is extending into the central, high-skill segments of the digital economy (BTU Digital Ecosystem Digest, 2025).

Georgia’s trajectory becomes even more striking when placed in a global context. International estimates suggest that women make up only around one quarter of ICT specialists worldwide, and in OECD countries the share of women in ICT occupations has increased by only about one percentage point over the past decade (World Bank; OECD). Against this backdrop, Georgia’s 29% share already exceeds the global average and points to a relatively rapid convergence toward more balanced participation. This suggests that smaller and less mature digital economies may, under certain conditions, adjust more quickly than large, highly entrenched technology markets.

Another important dimension is that the growth observed in Georgia is reflected not only in percentages, but also in absolute employment gains. Over the past two years, the ICT sector has absorbed around 1.6 thousand additional women, a substantial increase given the overall size of the country’s technology workforce. This indicates that the expansion of ICT employment in Georgia is no longer driven solely by internal reallocation within a predominantly male labour pool, but increasingly by the attraction of new female talent into the sector (BTU Digital Ecosystem Digest, 2025; Geostat).

Global labour-market research often highlights that rapid growth in digital sectors does not automatically translate into improved gender balance. In many countries, the number of ICT jobs expands while women’s participation remains stagnant or grows only marginally (OECD; World Bank). From this perspective, Georgia’s experience appears closer to an exception than to the rule. Within a relatively short period, the country has recorded a pace of growth in women’s ICT employment that many larger and more advanced economies struggle to achieve.

At this stage, it is already clear that the rise of women’s employment in Georgia’s ICT sector is no longer a hypothetical trend or a policy aspiration—it is a measurable economic reality. The factors driving this growth and the question of its long-term sustainability require separate, deeper analysis. What can already be stated with confidence, however, is that women’s employment in ICT professions in Georgia is expanding rapidly, at scale, and at a pace that stands out even in global comparison, placing the country in a distinctive position in the broader discussion on gender transformation in digital labour markets.

The BTU’s full study — “GENDER DYNAMICS IN THE ICT SECTOR IN GEORGIA: A DATA-DRIVEN OVERVIEW OF GAPS AND TRENDS” — is available at the following link.