UN Dy Sec-General stresses role of technology in empowering families

The Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations Amina Mohammed has stressed technology's significant role in developing societies, empowering families, facilitating access to services, addressing health and economic challenges, demographic changes, and achieving sustainable development, while noting its impact on relationships, and causing many problems such as spreading false and misleading information and threatening national identity.In a speech during the opening of the 30th Anniversary of the International Year of the Family Conference, organised by the Doha International Family Institute under the title "Family and Contemporary Megatrends" at the Qatar National Convention Center over two days, Amina Mohammed pointed to several challenges and megatrends that affect family life and narrow access to sustainable development, including climate change, floods, availability of health care, displacement and asylum, and others, adding that the family can bring about change through smart policies and digitization, expanding the use of artificial intelligence, achieving equality and facilitating access.If technology is not conducive, action should be taken to provide every family with comprehensive support to help them in the demographic transition through programs provided by governments in an effort to have global health and social policies that will bring about the desired change, she noted, stressing the importance of supporting families to face the challenges related to climate change by developing policies and raising awareness of the need to empower women and have them fully capable of playing the greater role in the family, which represents the nucleus of society, and facilitating access for people with disabilities and empowering them.She also pointed to the importance of directing policies to enhance solidarity between societies, strengthening regional and international coordination to advance the roles of women and empower them, and harnessing technology, at the same time, for the benefit of the family in a way that accelerates its technological and economic progress and development. She noted the aspirations of societies, including the promotion and protection of human rights, especially in light of the emphasis of the UN Convention on Artificial Intelligence on the importance of investing in the family as a basic unit for building society.She expressed her gratitude to the State of Qatar for organising this conference and to HH Chairperson of Qatar Foundation Sheikha Moza bint Nasser for her leadership in this field, her support for the international community and her work regarding the Sustainable Development Goals.The opening of the conference featured a video on the importance of the family and its reunification in light of the challenges of displacement and asylum, an artistic presentation (light painting), and a session reviewing the results of the youth summit held yesterday to discuss the conference themes, which concluded with the need to present policies and programs to support youth economically and socially, encourage families to use technology positively, as well as adapt roles within the family to keep pace with modern social and economic transformations, and conduct additional studies to understand how technology affects family relationships.