A gap for the digital gap: m4social leads inclusion at MWC25

The Board of Third Sector Social Entities of Catalonia, through its m4Social project, has visited the Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2025, occupying, for the ninth consecutive year, the most social space of this international congress with the European Social Network (ESN) and the Mobile World Capital Foundation. It is within this framework that the event 'For full digital inclusion' was organized last Thursday 6th of March, which revolved around the challenge of the digital divide and the need to alleviate it to advance towards an inclusive and equitable society.

The day, which took place in Hall 6 of the Fira Gran Via Barcelona, ​​consisted of four spaces: the presentation of the Taula's digital divide index project, the exhibition of the report 'Closing the digital gap: strategies for an inclusive digital transition in metropolises' by the Mobile World Capital Observatory, the presentation of the international experience 'E-inclusion in Ghent: digital exclusion is social exclusion' and a table of experiences where projects from social entities and different public administrations were presented.

Institutional welcome

Enric Morist Güell, president of the Third Social Sector Entities Panel, opened the day comparing the digitalized society to a high-speed train that not everyone can get on, and on which we need to work together to prevent this from happening. Alfonso Lara Montero, director of the ESN, continued, claiming the role that technology should have in social services and defending the empowerment of people to address the digital divide. Then it was the turn of Francesc Fajula de Quintana, CEO of the Mobile World Capital Barcelona Foundation, who explained the mission of this entity: “To leave a legacy at the MWC, to put people at the center.”

Maria Eugènia Gay Rossell, second deputy mayor and director of the Social Rights, Culture, Education and Life Cycles area of ​​the Barcelona City Council, asked to understand that “technology finds its essence in the dignity of human beings”. The intervention of Mónica Martínez Bravo, Minister of Social Rights and Inclusion of the Generalitat of Catalonia was also along these lines: “The social sector needs to believe it, to make technology a wind in its favor to be more effective in the fight for social justice”.

Digital gap, quantitative and qualitative

The first part of the day was dedicated to the presentation of two projects that addressed the digital gap from a more analytical perspective. The first was the Digital Gap Index that the Taula d’entitats del Tercer Sector is developing in collaboration with the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC). The presentation was made by Xavier Trabado i Farré, vice-president of the Taula, and Mireia Fernández-Ardèvol, professor and senior researcher at the UOC, who defined the index as an indicator of transactional data collected from private and public entities. The report is still being prepared, but once completed, the index will offer detailed data on three dimensions of digitalization in Catalonia: infrastructure, facilities and use; and the indicators will be available by region. The presentation ended with a resounding statement from Trabado, a preliminary conclusion of the index: “If we don't start investing forcefully in technology in social services, externalities will overwhelm us". 

If the first project presented in this space focused on clearly quantitative data, the report ‘Closing the digital divide: strategies for an inclusive digital transition in metropolises’, by the Mobile World Capital Observatory, focused on the more qualitative perspective of this problem. As explained by Chelo Fernández Rodríguez, head of the Mobile World Capital Observatory in Barcelona, ​​the report defines the digital divide as a “multidimensional” challenge with four dimensions of deficiencies: material access, digital literacy, equal opportunities and trust in the digital transition. The report also proposes strategies to address each of these deficiencies: the involvement of the private sector, application of the intersectional perspective and creating bonds of trust with the residents of the cities.

A success story in Europe: Ghent

This was followed by the presentation ‘E-Inclusion in Ghent: digital exclusion is social exclusion’, where Maria Ewema, coordinator of digital inclusion projects at the City of Ghent (Belgium), explained the ‘E-Inclusion’ project, which has been running since 2006 to try to ensure that the citizens of Ghent have sufficient resources and training to take advantage of all the opportunities offered by digital. Promoting a series of policies along these lines, E-Inclusion “focuses on digital inclusion, in order to prevent digital from causing exclusion”. In this sense, the project has two priorities: inclusion by design and multidimensionality (always offering three options for dealing with citizens).

Ewema ended up presenting the strategies learned in the almost two decades of the project: investing in digital inclusion to keep citizens active in society, appealing to people in the spaces they already visit, supporting organizations that work in this area, involving and motivating people by focusing on relevant skills and tools, and investing in inclusion by design.

Experiences of full socio-digital inclusion

In the last part of the session, representatives of entities and the administration presented their own experiences in working for digital inclusion. Núria Valls Carol, director of the Esplai Foundation's Observatorio Brechas Digitales (Digital Gaps Observatory), began by presenting the observatory as a space for debate with data and exemplifying its work with the presentation of the report 'Digital learning for social inclusion: analysis and strategies', which was produced by collecting impressions from citizens. She mentioned three key ideas: the acquisition of digital skills is linked to the improvement of the perception of social inclusion, the perception of digital skills improves as more courses are taken, and the reasons and interests for accessing training have to do with achieving full citizenship.

Also participating in this roundtable of experiences from entities were Joan March Nespleda, president of the Fundació Social Obra de Maria, which has implemented a volunteer management application with the elderly in collaboration with the Federation of Elderly Associations of Catalonia (FATEC); Noelia Torres Baños, director of Factoria F5, which is carrying out a training and socio-labor insertion project in web development with socially vulnerable women; and Bàrbara Outeiro Ramírez, vice president of the governing board and head of open innovation at Suara Cooperativa, which has launched a pilot test that addresses the digital divide to facilitate the work of family workers with the elderly.

Regarding experiences from the administration, Fuertes Ledesma, Commissioner for Social Action of the Barcelona City Council, spoke, who presented a Chat Bot from the city council that handles benefit inquiries; and Teresa Llorens Carbonell, Secretary of Childhood, Adolescence and Youth of the Department of Social Rights and Inclusion of the Generalitat de Catalunya, who spoke about the CodiCrack project, which seeks to improve the digital skills of children and adolescents at risk of social exclusion.
 

Social justice (shyly) makes its way to MWC

However, the session ‘For full digital inclusion’ was precisely what the title says. All the presentations made it clear that the digital divide must be addressed as soon as possible to prevent technological innovation from becoming yet another space where social justice and equity are left aside. From a positive tone, and offering alternatives, the different interventions called for (and, in some cases, demonstrated) an ethical technology and a critical digitalization, which precisely takes advantage of the advantages of this medium to ensure that all citizens, and not just a part, get on the train of society.

A perspective that stands out in a setting like that of the MWC. In fact, these reflections took place in a stand that stood out in Hall 6 for its architectural flourishes, but not so much for its surface area, which is not exactly generous. A metaphor for the entire event: despite the realistic and critical vision of the social sector, which recognizes the imperative need to address digital inclusion to ensure that digitalization will be an improvement and not a threat to equity, the space reserved for this perspective in the technology sector is, for the moment, rather small.