Thursday March 28th, 2024
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Uber and HarassMap Fight Harassment on Egyptian Streets

Uber have partnered up with HarassMap to take positive action against the epidemic that is sexual harassment in Egypt.

Staff Writer

On-demand car service Uber has partnered with Egypt’s leading anti-sexual harassment initiative HarassMap to train their drivers to turn their workplace into a zero-tolerance to harassment area.

The partnership, aimed at offering safe taxi rides for women in Cairo, aims at taking positive action and standing up to a social problem that NGOs have termed an “epidemic” in the country. According to a report by the UN, 99.3% of women in Egypt reported to have been victim to sexual harassment at least once in their lives.

HarassMap, a leading volunteer-based initiative created in 2010 to end the social acceptability of sexual harassment in Egypt, has partnered with the car service company under their Safe Corporates Program, an initiative with which they train businesses to become role models and lead other corporates in joining a nationwide movement for positive action against sexual harassment.  

The non-profit organisation had become popular amongst Egyptian women during the protests following the 25th January revolution, as the entity used interactive mapping to reduce the social acceptability of sexual harassment, allowing users to report and localise sexual harassment hot spots through mobile technology.

Through the partnership with Uber, Harassmap will modify and strengthen the company’s driver screening and training process, ensuring a harassment-free drive for women. Through training provided by the organisaion, every driver-partner on the Uber app will be trained on recognising, preventing, and taking positive action against sexual harassment, which users will be able to recognise through a sticker in their car vowing to “take positive action against sexual harassment”.

You can check out Uber's Facebook page here.