Promoting basic education for women and girls ... - library.unesco-ii...

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The drop-out rate is relatively high among the girls,
but the reverse is true of repetition rate. The 2001 school
survey recorded 641,072 repeaters at the primary level.
Of this figure, 284,536 (44.38 per cent) were girls.
Access to basic education is characterized by
regional disparities, as shown in Table 2. Regions with
relatively high enrolment rates also tend to record relatively
high girls’ participation rates. This phenomenon has
been explained in terms of a combination of socio-cultural
and historical factors.
In some regions, initiation rites are followed
by boys returning to school, while the girls are
considered ripe for marriage.
Some parts of the country were more intensively
exposed to Christian missionary educational
influences than others.
Some areas also suffered more severely from
the post-independence civil war than others.
Table 1. Mozambique: primary school enrolment – 2001
Grade
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Total
Total enrolment
844 732
607 356
475 903
338 374
242 246
152 696
109 438
2 770 745
Number of girls
396 451
269 761
203 225
139 299
94 191
60 006
42 903
1 205 836
Mozambique
Girls (%)
46.92
44.42
42.70
41.17
38.88
39.30
39.20
43.52
Source: Annual School Survey – 2001
Gender parity is more noticeable in the larger cities. In the
capital (Maputo) and the administrative region around it,
there are in fact more girls than boys in primary schools.