II.

The Developing World

Most literacy surveys use this basic definition, particularly surveys of literacy levels in developing countries. Based on this definition about 4 in 5 of the population of the world over 15 years of age would be considered literate. According to information from UNESCO released in 2003 more women are now literate than ever before.

The number of adults who are illiterate in the world has fallen from 22.4 per cent in 1995 to 20.3 per cent in 2000; in total from about 872 million adults in 1995 to 862 million adults in 2000. If this trend continues the number of illiterate adults in the world in 2010 should have dropped to 824 million, or 16.5 per cent. The largest fall in illiteracy has been in Africa and Asia.

Although women continue to make up 2 in every 3 of the illiterate adults in the world, the number of illiterate women is falling and the percentage of illiterate women has dropped from 28.5 per cent to 25.8 per cent. This tendency is particularly marked in Africa, where, for the first time, most women are now literate. Although discrimination is one major reason why girls and women lack access to education, countries in the developing world increasingly recognize the benefits of providing access to education for girls and women, particularly as the children of educated women are more likely to become educated themselves.

Progress is slow, however, and about 20 per cent of adults remain illiterate. Worryingly, at the present rate, it is likely that the number of illiterate adults will further fall by about 5 per cent by the year 2015. Just as worryingly, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) reports that 121 million children in the world are not in school and most of these are girls.

Although the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 and the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child established education as a basic human right, about 1 in 5 adults in the world were unable to read and write at the beginning of the 21st century.