A Statistics South Africa survey has found that more than 90% of South Africans over the age of 15 can read and write. Yet the nation still remains one of the most illiterate in the world.

This is according to a study by the Central Connecticut State University, which analyses a country’s ‘literate behaviour’ – in other words, accessibility to reading material rather than the actual ability to read. It ranked South Africa 56th out of 61 nations.

As reported by Business Tech, the rankings are based on five indicators of literate health: libraries (the number of libraries and volumes publicly accessible); newspapers (paid-for dailies, circulation, online editions and newspaper exports); education inputs (years of schooling and public expenditure); outputs (reading assessment scores for younger and older students) and computer availability (the percentage of households with computers).

Botswana, at 61, was the most illiterate country in the poll, while Tunisia was the top-performing African nation at 52. Morocco placed 58th.

15 March 2016
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