30
Gender and Development in the Middle East and North Africa
FIGURE 2.3
Rising Female and Male Literacy Rates in the MENA Region, 1970–2000 Percent 80 70 60
74.4
Female MENA Male MENA Middle-income countries
65.8
55.5
63.6 53.0
52.5
50 43.7
41.5
40 30.1
30 20
39.7
27.3
16.6
10 0 1970
1980
1990
2000
Source: World Bank 2003f.
Women, particularly, have benefited. In 1970, women made up only 16.4 percent of literate adults. By the year 2000, they accounted for more than 50 percent. Yet, a large gender gap in literacy remains. Men are still 40 percent more likely to be literate than women. And illiteracy among rural women remains a persistent challenge. In Morocco, only 1 in 10 rural women can read and write, and in the Republic of Yemen only 1 in 9 can. But the region’s progress to date has been strong. Box 2.2 describes some innovative approaches to literacy training for women in the Republic of Yemen and the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Progress in Reducing Gender Gaps in School Enrollment School enrollment numbers are important indicators of disparities in access to education. In primary education, MENA is on its way to closing gender gaps in enrollment (figure 2.4). Across the region, enrollment rates for girls are virtually as high as those for boys. At the secondary level, many MENA countries appear to have closed the gender gap. Indeed, in 6 of the 15 countries with data for 2000, girls had higher gross secondary enrollment rates than did boys (figure 2.5). However, several countries still had low secondary enrollment rates for girls in 2000: