AMMAN - Although the illiteracy rate among females is on the decline, more needs to be done to reduce it further, according to experts.
The illiteracy rate among females aged 15 years and above dropped between 2007 and 2010, according to data compiled by the Department of Statistics (DoS) for tracking year-to-year educational development.
In 2007, 11.6 per cent of the female population was illiterate, but by late 2010, the number went down to 10.3 per cent, according to the DoS.
The overall illiteracy rate stood at 6.9 per cent during the first half of 2010, and 3.7 per cent among males, according to a field study conducted by the DoS.
The education ministry started to combat illiteracy in 1952 through systemised programmes at 548 illiteracy eradication centres across the Kingdom, 516 of them designated for women. To date 6,430 students have graduated from these centres, including 5,988 women.
While there are clear advancements in lowering the rate of female illiteracy, the progress is insufficient, according to a sociologist.
"It appears as though we are stuck at 10 per cent and are not able to decrease beyond that," Musa Shteiwi, founder and director of the Jordan Centre for Social Research, told The Jordan Times in a recent phone interview.
Female illiteracy rates varied across the Kingdom, with Amman Governorate recording the lowest at 7.1 per cent, and Maan Governorate the highest at 19.2 per cent, a recent DoS study found.
"If you look at the distribution of illiteracy, there is more in rural areas... There is a disparity," Shtewi said.
But DoS Director General Haider Freihat described the difference between Amman and some of the other governorates in terms of female education as "insignificant".
"It is only natural to see people in the villages more illiterate than in the cities," he told The Jordan Times over the phone last week.
The inability to clearly recognise this disparity as a threatening issue may in itself be contributing to the problem of female illiteracy, according to Lubna Dawany Nimry, an attorney at law and a human rights activist.
Seeing illiteracy as "natural" only exacerbates the problem; instead, "we should try to understand the reasons behind this deficiency", she pointed out.
The reason behind the high illiteracy rates among females is not solely due to the lack of educational resources, Nimry told The Jordan Times.
"If that were the case, then it would not make sense that more females than males, on average, are enrolled in universities across the Kingdom."
She attributed the problem to the lack of work opportunities.
The participation of women in the labour force stands at 14.9 per cent, while women entrepreneurs account for 3.9 per cent of all in the country, according to a recent study by the Economic and Social Council.
"The numbers capturing the participation of women in the labour force are abysmal," Nimry said.
She believes a paradigm shift in thinking is needed: Women should stop believing that their fate is only to work in the "kitchen" and instead find jobs that could enhance their opportunities and make them more independent.
"Let us - governmental sectors, NGOs, interested folks - all join to remind women who live outside of the capital that the prospect of becoming a lawyer or a doctor is no longer impossible. It is our challenge both to remind women of their innate capacity to excel and to greatly reduce the illiteracy rate in Jordan. Let us rise to the occasion and overcome this challenge," Nimry told The Jordan Times.
© Jordan Times 2011
