UNICEF statistical review: Progress for Children

On 10 December 2007, UNICEF launched a new publication, Progress for Children: A World Fit for Children Statistical Review. With more than 60 pages of graphs and tables, the report draws a detailed statistical picture of the current state of the world's children. The publication is divided into sections organized by Millennium Development Goal.

• MDG 1: Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
• MDG 2: Achieve universal primary education
• MDG 3: Promote gender equality and empower women
• MDG 4: Reduce child mortality
• MDG 5: Improve maternal health
• MDG 6: Combat HIV and AIDS, malaria and other diseases
• MDG 7: Ensure environmental sustainability

An additional section has data on protection against abuse, exploitation, and violence.

Some findings of the report in the area of education are:

• The number of children out of school has fallen from 115 million in 2002 to 93 million in 2005-2006.
• More than three quarters of all children out of school worldwide live in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.
• Secondary school net attendance or enrollment rates are below 50 percent in many countries, including most of Africa.
• Almost all countries in North and South America, Europe, Central Asia, and East Asia have reached the goal of gender parity in primary education.
• Few countries have reached gender parity in secondary education.
• Child labor, which interferes with education, is most prevalent in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Excerpt from Progress for Children: Data on primary and secondary education

Source: UNICEF 2007: p. 14-15.

References

• UNICEF. 2007. Progress for Children: A World Fit for Children Statistical Review. New York: UNICEF. (Download in PDF format, 3.6 MB)

Related articles

• Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2008
• Global Education Digest 2007 by UNESCO
• UN Millennium Development Goals Report 2007

External links

• Progress for Children website by UNICEF
• Millennium Development Goals

Friedrich Huebler, 15 December 2007, Creative Commons License
Permanent URL: http://huebler.blogspot.com/2007/12/unicef-statistical-review-progress-for.html

Primary school attendance by state in India

The average primary school net attendance rate in India is 83 percent according to data from a Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) conducted in 2005 and 2006. However, the national average hides considerable regional variation in primary school attendance. India is divided into 28 states and 7 union territories. With the DHS data it is possible to calculate the primary school NAR in 29 states and territories, shown in the map and table below.

Primary school attendance in India by state and territory, 2006

Data source: India DHS 2005-06

The states with the highest primary school net attendance rates, between 98 and 99 percent, are Himachal Pradesh, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu. In these states, virtually all children of primary school age are in school. Six other states also have primary NAR values above 90 percent: Assam, Goa, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Mizoram, and Uttarakhand. In fifteen states and territories the primary NAR is between 80 and 90 percent.

In six states, fewer than four out of five children of primary school age are in school: Arunachal Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Meghalaya, Nagaland, and Sikkim. By far the lowest primary school attendance rates are observed in Bihar (59 percent) and Meghalaya (60 percent), two of the poorest and economically least developed states of India.

Primary school attendance in India by state and territory, 2006

State or Territory	Primary NAR (%)	State or Territory	Primary NAR (%)
Andaman and Nicobar Islands	-	Lakshadweep	-
Andhra Pradesh	89.2	Madhya Pradesh	81.0
Arunachal Pradesh	67.3	Maharashtra	91.7
Assam	91.1	Manipur	80.3
Bihar	58.5	Meghalaya	60.4
Chandigarh	-	Mizoram	91.8
Chhattisgarh	86.5	Nagaland	71.9
Dadra and Nagar Haveli	-	Orissa	86.8
Daman and Diu	-	Puducherry	-
Delhi	89.9	Punjab	89.1
Goa	94.1	Rajasthan	81.0
Gujarat	91.1	Sikkim	77.6
Haryana	87.6	Tamil Nadu	98.5
Himachal Pradesh	97.8	Tripura	89.6
Jammu and Kashmir	86.7	Uttar Pradesh	81.4
Jharkhand	72.1	Uttarakhand	93.4
Karnataka	88.5	West Bengal	85.1
Kerala	98.1	India	83.3

Data source: India DHS 2005-06

Related articles

• Primary school attendance in India in 2006
  
• India has 21 million children out of school
• Educational attainment in India, 1950-2000
• Primary school completion in India, 1950-2000
• Education disparity in South Asia

External links

• States and territories of India (Wikipedia)
• Demographic and Health Survey (DHS), India
• National Family Health Survey (NFHS), India

Friedrich Huebler, 9 December 2007 (edited 12 October 2008), Creative Commons License
Permanent URL: http://huebler.blogspot.com/2007/12/primary-school-attendance-by-state-in.html

EFA Global Monitoring Report 2008

On 29 November 2007, UNESCO released the 2008 edition of the annual Education for All Global Monitoring Report, with the title Education for All by 2015: Will we make it? The report, now in its sixth edition, monitors progress towards the six Education for All goals adopted at the World Education Forum in Dakar, Senegal in 2000:

1. Expand and improve early childhood care and education.
2. Provide free and compulsory universal primary education by 2015.
3. Equitable access to learning and life-skills programs.
4. Achieve a 50% improvement in adult literacy rates.
5. Eliminate gender disparities in primary and secondary education by 2005 and at all levels by 2015.
6. Improve all aspects of the quality of education.

Some highlights of the 2008 report are:

• Between 1999 and 2005, primary school enrollment rose from 647 million to 688 million worldwide. The rate of increase was particularly high in Sub-Saharan Africa and in South and West Asia. As a result, the global number of children out of school fell from 96 million in 1999 to 72 million in 2005.
• Projections based on current trends show that more than 50 countries will not achieve universal primary education by 2015.
• One third of all countries missed the goal of gender parity in primary education by 2005. Two thirds of all countries missed the goal of gender parity in secondary education. According to projections, more than 90 countries will not reach gender parity in primary and secondary education by 2015.
• Fourteen countries abolished primary school fees since 2000 but the cost of schooling remains an obstacle for millions of children.
• The emphasis by the international community on primary education has come at the expense of early childhood education and literacy programs for youth and adults.
• One in five adults lacks basic literacy skills. Women account for two thirds of all illiterate adults worldwide. Three quarters of all countries for which projections were calculated will miss the goal of halving adult illiteracy rates by 2015.

The EFA Global Monitoring Report offers a great amount of data and statistical analysis. An annex contains more than 140 pages of statistical tables with national, regional and global data up to the year 2005.

References

• UNESCO. 2007. Education for all by 2015: Will we make it? - EFA global monitoring report 2008. Paris: UNESCO. (Download in PDF format, 11.8 MB)

Related articles

• EFA Global Monitoring Report 2009
• Global Education Digest 2007 by UNESCO
• UN Millennium Development Goals Report 2007

External links

• Announcement of the EFA Global Monitoring Report 2008 by UNESCO
• Regional overviews of progress towards the EFA goals
• Education for All website by UNESCO

Friedrich Huebler, 3 December 2007 (edited 8 December 2008), Creative Commons License
Permanent URL: http://huebler.blogspot.com/2007/12/efa-global-monitoring-report-2008.html