RAMALLAH, September 7, 2017 (WAFA) – Illiteracy rate in Palestine is among the lowest in the world and stood at 3.1 percent in 2016, the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) said in a report published Thursday.
Marking the International Literacy Day which coincides on September 8, PCBS president Ula Awad said that illiteracy rate in Palestine dropped from 13.9 percent in 1997 to 3.1 percent in 2016, which means about 90,000 persons over 15 years of age are classified as illiterate in 2016.
When broken down by gender, illiteracy rate among males dropped from 7.8 percent in 1997 to 1.4 percent in 2016, while for females it fell from 20.3 percent to 4.8 percent.
According to UNESCO Institute for Statistics, the illiteracy rate among persons 15 years and above in Arab states was 24.8 percent (about 64.6 million illiterate) in 2016: for males, 17.4 percent (23.7 million illiterate) compared to 32.8 percent for females (40.9 million illiterate). For the same year, the rate was 13.8 percent (about 750.1 million illiterate) in the world among the same age group: for males. 10.2 percent (277.2 million illiterate) compared to 17.3 percent for females (472.9 million illiterate).
This, said Awad, makes Palestine one of the lowest in the world in illiteracy rate.
Based on statistics, more than half of the Palestinian illiterates in 2016 were elderly, with around 54 percent of illiterate persons are aged 65 years and over, while the lowest rate is among persons aged 15 to 29 years or 30 to 44 years.
When broken down by region, illiteracy rate among persons 15 years and above in Palestine was 3.2 percent in the West Bank (59,900 illiterate) and 2.8 percent in Gaza Strip (30,000 illiterate).
Illiteracy rate in rural areas reached 4.4 percent (23,300 illiterate), while it scored 3 percent in the refugee camps (8,500 illiterate) and 2.8 percent (58,100 thousands illiterate) in urban areas. Male illiteracy rate was highest in rural localities, followed by urban areas and refugee camps. Female illiteracy rate was highest in rural localities, followed by refugee camps and urban areas respectively.
M.K.
