Literacy rates are rising globally but another $2.5 billion dollars of international funding is needed annually to meet adult literacy needs, concludes a UNESCO report.
The report, which also shows concern at the slow progress being made in South and West Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa, was presented to the United Nations General Assembly on October 6, at a halfway point in the United Nations Literacy Decade (2003-2012) for which UNESCO is the lead agency.
It shows the number of adults who are not literate decreased from 871 million during 1985-1994 to 774 million in the 2000-2006, pushing the global adult literacy rate up from 76 per cent to 83.6 per cent. Nonetheless, three quarters of the 127 countries for which projections were calculated will miss the goal of halving adult illiteracy rates by 2015 and the literacy gender gap remains virtually unchanged; 63 per cent of illiterate adults were women in 1985-1994, compared to 64 per cent in 2000-2006.

On October 7 UNESCO’s new publication, The Global Literacy Challenge, will be presented at a lunch in the presence of First Lady of the United States Laura Bush, UNESCO’s Honorary Ambassador for the United Nations Literacy Decade.