Literacy in the Middle East
First, the region as whole must be considered. From this broad perspective, it is possible to recognize large trends in the region, as well as identify outliers and countries that lead, or fall behind, in women’s access to education. It is also interesting to evaluate the role that a country’s level of wealth has in women’s access to education, since there are large variations throughout the region. The region as a whole has made considerable progress in the last two decades in regards to female access to education. However, the gender gap still remains.
Table 1 shows the discrepancy between male and female literacy rates across the Middle East in 2015 for the total population. Worldwide, female literacy rates lag behind those of males, but the global average for this discrepancy is about five percent for youths and nine percent for adults (International Literacy Data). In every Middle East nation evaluated here, female literacy follows this trend. However, there are wide differences in Yemen, Egypt, Iraq, and Syria, which all have female literacy rate at least ten percent below their male counterparts. This exceeds the global average, meaning that female literacy in these countries is a more substantial issue than in most countries. Egypt and Syria will be examined more closely later in the study.
Table 2 more closely examines female illiteracy in women ages 15 to 24 across the Middle East. In every country except Qatar, the latest data shows that at least 40 percent of females are illiterate. Most countries have seen no major changes in female illiteracy since 2005, though Bahrain and Jordan have seen slight decreases. Troublingly, Palestine and the UAE have both seen substantial increases in illiteracy.
Investing in women’s access to quality education should be a priority in order to lower this rate as much as possible in every country. In this graph, Qatar is an interesting example because of its already-low female illiteracy rate. This is because Qatar is a rich, oil-funded rentier state, and its expenditure on education in 2008 was 2.44 percent, which represented 7.35 percent of its total government expenditure (UIS). While these numbers are seemingly low, Qatar’s vast resources and relatively small population mean that its GDP per capita is actually much higher than other nations in the region. While Qatar could afford a GDP per capita of 84,628 USD in 2008, the next highest GDP per capita in the region was just 46,309 USD, in the also oil-rich UAE (UIS). Even there, they only afford slightly more than half of Qatar’s rich value. Because Qatar’s resources mean it can afford to invest in its people, female education and literacy are a priority. Therefore, this graph indicates that one of the most important factors that contributes to female literacy is government expenditure on education. Without priority status at the state level, easy access to education for women cannot be achieved.
