people and planet

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in the social and political life of the community (UIL, 2016).
Depending on the structure of the labour market, other
cognitive skills, such as the ability to operate a computer,
can also lead to improved employment opportunities.
LINKING BASIC COGNITIVE SKILLS WITH
DECENT WORK
A higher level of basic cognitive skills, as captured
through an internationally comparable measure of
literacy proficiency, is associated with a higher chance
of access to decent work opportunities. New analysis for
this report shows that the average probability of holding
a decent job almost doubles between those whose
reading skills only allow them to locate a single piece
of information in a short text (19%) and those who can
interpret information from complex texts (35%).
The analysis used data on adults from urban areas of
seven middle income countries, drawing on the World
Bank Skills Towards Employability and Productivity
(STEP) survey, which was conducted in 2011–2013. For the
purpose of the analysis, a job was defined as decent if
it satisfied three criteria: it offered an adequate number
of working hours per week, provided employees with a
written contract to protect their rights, and guaranteed
social benefits. On average across the seven countries,
one in four employees held a decent job according to
these criteria. Nationally the figure ranged from one in
eight in Ghana to one in two in Armenia as a result of
variations in the sector composition of employment
(between agriculture, manufacturing and services) and
labour policies.
Measurement of literacy skills is covered in depth in
Chapter 15 on target 4.6. Across the seven countries in
the present sample, literacy proficiency varied greatly.
In Ghana, 61% of adults read below even the lowest level
of proficiency, compared with 1% in Armenia. Completing
secondary school makes a big difference: in Colombia and
Viet Nam, adults who had not done so were more than
twice as likely not to reach level 2 of literacy proficiency.
ICT AND DIGITAL LITERACY SKILLS
ICT has quickly become essential to daily life and
work in most countries. A survey of 32 mostly middle
income countries found that, on average in 2014, 38%
of households had a computer at home and 44% used
the internet at least occasionally (or had a smartphone).
The latter measure ranged from 8% in Pakistan and 11%
in Bangladesh to 62% in Lebanon and 63% in China (Pew
Research Center, 2015).
Demographic shifts and increasing access to education
mean ICT use will continue to rise in the next 15 years.
Already, the internet is used by 66% of people aged 18
to 34, compared with 27% of those over 35, and by 75%
of those with at least secondary education, compared
with 19% of those with less (Pew Research Centre, 2015).
It is essential for education systems to help everybody
acquire ICT and digital literacy skills, especially where
a considerable proportion of the population is at risk
of being excluded from society and work opportunities
because of a ‘digital divide’.
ICT skills
Defining, measuring and monitoring ICT skills presents
several challenges for making comparisons over time and
across countries. Technology – and the skills needed to
use it – develops so rapidly that what is relevant today
may be less so tomorrow. And wide disparities between
countries in technology availability mean the context in
which such skills are exercised differs considerably.
The proposed global indicator for target 4.4 is the
percentage of individuals with ICT skills according to the
definition of the International Telecommunication Union
(ITU), formulated in the framework of the Partnership
on Measuring ICT for Development (ITU, 2014). ‘ICT
skills’ refers to nine computer-related activities that
individuals have undertaken in the previous three months
(Table 13.1). The information is to be collected by national
statistical offices as part of standard household surveys
or censuses.
The ITU maintains globally comparable indicators in
the World Telecommunication/ICT Indicators database.
TABLE 13.1:
Computer-related activities included in the definition of ICT skills
Copy or move a file or folder
Use copy and paste tools to duplicate or move information within a document
Send emails with attached files (e.g. a document, picture or video)
Use basic arithmetic formulas in a spreadsheet
Connect and install new devices (e.g. a modem, camera or printer)
Find, download, install and configure software
Create electronic presentations with presentation software (including text, images, sound and video)
Transfer files between a computer and other devices
Write a computer program using a specialized programming language
Source: ITU (2014).
2016 • GLOBAL EDUCATION MONITORING REPORT 245