Population, territory and sustainable development

69
Table IV.14
LATIN AMERICA: AVERAGE SCHOOLING OF RURAL POPULATION BY AGE GROUP,
1990 AND 2000 CENSUS ROUNDS
(Years of schooling)
Country
Ages 15 to 24 Ages 25 to 39
1990 2000 1990 2000
Argentina 7.2 7.8 6.7 6.6
Bolivia (Plurinational State of) 5.8 6.6 5.3 5.4
Brazil 3.3 4.3 3.0 3.4
Chile 8.2 9.1 7.4 8.1
Costa Rica 4.6 6.3 3.8 4.5
Ecuador 5.5 6.7 4.4 6.4
Guatemala 3.1 3.8 2.4 2.8
Mexico 3.1 6.6 2.4 5.5
Nicaragua 2.6 4.6 2.2 3.5
Panama 6.8 7.1 6.5 7.0
Paraguay 5.3 6.8 4.7 5.7
Peru 5.2 7.9 4.1 4.8
Dominican Republic 5.0 5.8 4.0 4.1
Venezuela (Bolivarian Republic of) 4.6 6.0 3.3 4.7
Source: Latin American and Caribbean Demographic Centre (CELADE) - Population Division of ECLAC, on the basis of
processing of census microdatabases using Retrieval of data for small areas by microcomputer (REDATAM).
Despite the gains made in the past decade in the rural population’s average years of schooling,
most of the countries still show substantial lags when the figures are compared with the urban population.
The data in figure IV.12 illustrate this situation, which occurs to a greater or lesser extent in all the
countries examined. In general, the rural population aged 30 to 59 has on average three or four years
fewer of schooling than the urban population of the same age. The largest rural-urban gaps occur in Peru
—whose rural population has on average 5.6 years of schooling fewer than its urban population— in
Nicaragua, with a difference of 4.6 years, and in Guatemala, with a difference of 4.4 years. The smallest
gaps are found in the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica and Argentina, where the rural population has on
average 2.9 fewer years of schooling than the urban population.
When they conducted a more specific study by age group, Rodríguez and Meneses (2011) found
smaller gaps in the younger population (over three years only in Honduras and Nicaragua) and —as may
be expected— these increase with age. Nonetheless, regardless of age group, the largest gaps occur in
Colombia, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. Certainly, the size of the gaps by age group reflects the
countries’ efforts to increase the coverage of primary and secondary education. Costa Rica and Uruguay
show the smallest gaps across all age groups and they are joined by Chile for the 25-to-39 age group, and
additionally by Mexico and the Dominican Republic for the group aged under 25 (see figure IV.13).
Gaps are also evident in school repetition and dropout rates, which are higher in rural than in
urban areas. The reasons for this geographical inequality include lack of education services accessible at a
reasonable distance, larger numbers of schools with an incomplete grade structure, greater family pressure
for young people to work, and less skilled teachers since, generally speaking, there are no significant
incentives for teachers to work in rural areas or in difficult settings (Blanco and Cusato, 2004).