FEMALE EDUCATION: ANOTHER GAP TO BRIDGE

The education of girls and women has been a central concern of the international community for at least the last decade. Though much progress has been made since the World Conference on Education for All (Jomtien, Thailand, 1990), the situation of women’s education remains deeply worrying in several Third World countries.

38.3% of women are illiterate in developing countries, while their illiteracy rate in the least developed countries is as high as 61.9%. The worst affected regions are sub-Saharan Africa (52.7% illiteracy rate for women), the Arab states (55.8%) and South Asia (63.4%)¹.

^1.The statistics are drawn from UNESCO’s Statistical Yearbook, 1997.

Female illiteracy has a direct impact on the schooling of girls. Areas with the highest illiteracy rates for women are also those with a low enrolment rate of girls in schools. In Sub-Saharan Africa for example, only 52.2% of girls are enrolled in the three levels of schooling² (primary, secondary and higher); this figure falls to 50.8% in Arab states and to 43.3% in South Asia.

^2.These are gross enrolment ratios. The ratio is obtained by dividing the total number of pupils in a specific level of education, without reference to their age, by the population of the age group corresponding to that educational level according to the national education system.

The table opposite indicates gross enrolment ratios in schools and gender-based illiteracy rates in the regions and groups of countries where girls have least access to schooling.

Gross enrolment ratio by level of education and illiteracy rates by gender (1995)

Source: Statistical Yearbook, UNESCO, 1997