Obstacles to developing human capital in Yemen [Archives:2005/898/Reportage]
RAIDAN A. AL-SAQQAF
[email protected]
FOR YEMEN TIMES
Yemen is an interesting country for studying its human capital development due to its geo-political stretch, historical background, cultural experiences and economic development. Indeed, the significance of studying human capital in Yemen is derived from the proven importance of investing in knowledge and education which is, in turn, a prime engine for stimulating sustainable economic growth especially in the developing countries.
Until date, developing human capital in the country has been ignored in spite of the recent political and economic developments the country has witnessed since its establishment in 1990, considering Human capital to be the people's ability to be economically productive, and can be influenced by education and training.
Investment in Human Capital
Although most models of economic growth stress the importance of investment in creating a knowledge society, there are several indications that point towards a serious gap in knowledge between Yemen and its counterparts in the developed and developing world, reflected in the inability of Yemeni people to satisfy their non-material needs in addition to their economic constrains, therefore human capital in Yemen requires special attention and understanding of the political and economic circumstances that shape the human capital of the region. In line with Prof. Amartya Sen argument that development has to be more concentrated with enhancing the lives of people: what a person is, or can be, and does, or can do. Therefore, education is essential to a satisfying and rewarding life and is fundamental to the broader notion of expanded human capabilities that lie at the heart of the meaning of development.
Similarly, education plays a key role in the ability of the country in order to modernize and absorb modern technology and in order to develop the capacity for self sustaining growth and development, considering the example of South Korea's commitment to education for the last thirty years and how this commitment helped it gain momentum as the pioneer of the Asian Tigers in economic development. Therefore, Education is largely considered to be a recipe for economic prosperity; “Arab countries should emulate the success of the Asian Tiger nations by adopting a policy of early and intensive investment in education, accompanied by sustained and rapid improvement of its level,” say the authors of the Arab Human Development Report 2003.
Objectives of Development
There are three broad objectives of development shared by most developing countries, i.e. to increase the availability and widen the distribution of basic life-sustaining goods, to raise the standard of living, and to expand the range of economic and social choices available. However, reaching these three objectives of development does not solely depend on financial development or economic wellbeing, but it also includes creating a knowledge society that enriches the lives of its people and economic growth through the current supply and prospected demand of skills and knowledge, all in order to realize the potential impact on individual incomes and the collective economic development of the country as a whole.
However, creating a knowledge society is not an easy task considering the current economic, cultural and political obstacles in Yemen. The collective body of previous research around the subject has indicated that issues such as access to basic education, the availability of proper primary schooling facilities, child labor, illiteracy, gender inequalities, inequalities within countries and societies, cost and quality of education among other social and economic factors are the most important obstacles specific to the Middle East region and most apparent in Yemen in order to achieve considerable development similar to that of the Asian Tigers, These obstacles are discussed in the following pages.
Obstacles to Development in Yemen
One of the major obstacles Yemen faces is the nature of the education, as religious education plays a parallel and substantial role in the upbringing of children, especially with limited governmental control over the curriculum, the tutoring or even the methodology of religious teachings, particularly as such a sensitive topic can influence to a great extent the mindset of the youth regarding the various happenings taking place around them and formulate various interpretations such as conspiracy theories or even resort to extremist actions.
Yet, a significant number of students fail to complete secondary education because of the poor quality of teaching or non-availability of tutors especially in rural areas of the country, hereby impairing education that should help families escape some of the vicious cycles of poverty in which they may be trapped. Therefore children and youth tend to leave their schools in order to work due to their lack of belief in the returns of schooling.
Even students who successfully complete their primary education and wish to continue their higher education locally, the non-availability of suitable teaching facilities and qualified tutors in scientific disciplines induce students to pursue careers in non scientific subjects, statistics indicate that as little as 2~3% of students in Yemen major in applied sciences in their college education while that %age is at 20 % for south Korean students This is evident in the low number of patents and original contributions to the global sum of knowledge.
Another important obstacle is sexism; the conservative nature of the Yemeni society has established several constrains on women's participation in the society even if it was educational purposes, while this is slowly changing in most parts of the country, a considerable %age of women still suffer from sexism and gender-based discrimination against their educational options and literacy.
Nonetheless, the society as a whole suffers as a result of illiteracy through the failure of parents to assist their schooling children to learn and the non-ability to read any educational material they come across because of illiteracy, as the UNICEF indicated that several countries in the Middle East and North Africa region will not be able to reach their Human development objectives as a consequence of illiteracy, i.e. with implicit reference to Yemen.
Population distribution is yet another issue, as 72 % of the country's population resides in rural areas while the bulk of schools and education centers are located in the urban areas, hereby forcing disadvantaged scholars to migrate to urban areas in search of better education and further education compared to the schooling available in their villages and small towns that are far worse in terms of quality than urban cities.
However, even after migrating graduates from these rural schools can barely compete with graduates of urban cities, as most of them fail to get the quality and grades that can entitle them admission in colleges due to their poor educational background, especially as only ~6 % of all successful university graduates originate from the rural areas accommodating 72 % of the total Yemeni population.
Yet, in spite of urbanization, modernization and the exploitation of natural resources in Yemen, primary school enrollment rates still lag far behind that of other developing countries; according to a recent research undertaken by The Conference Board, Primary school enrollment rates for low-income countries have risen from about 65 % in 1970 to about 94 % in 2001, while it barely reached 60 % in 2001 in Yemen in spite of the considerable economic resources the country has comparing to other developing countries.
The Conference Board also forecasted that by 2035 the emerging world may have almost 100 % literacy and with a significant rise in the number of knowledgeable college graduates from developing countries in consistency with their own cultures and economic values. However, literacy is no guarantee for creating a knowledge society or the build up of substantial Human Capital to drive economic development in developing countries, as there are fundamental issues that are currently ignored by most of the Yemeni population, indicated by the tiny numbers of patents or the citation of research originating by researchers in the country, as it is the quality of the Human Capital that matters not the number of people who can sign their names.
Therefore, policy makers in Yemen should give direct attention to the Development of Human Capital in an equal manner to the attention given to economic development especially as the economy is growing rapidly, as evidence suggests that the level and quality of education are unjustly distributed among the people in Yemen, which has the highest rate of illiteracy in the Middle East region of 51% (74% among women) and therefore has recently launched an initiative for the Development of Human Capital in a similar manner to its neighbors in the Middle East.
The Government of Yemen ought to play a vital role in the build up of human capital through education and training through understanding the social, political and economics sources and causes of the severe inequalities and inefficiencies that continue to obstruct the accumulation of human capital in country. To that end, the government has allocated 10 % of its GDP to Education through three ministerial strategies, the first was the reform of primary and secondary education, the second is the activation of the technical and mechanical training ministry, and the third is through the Higher education and scientific research, however, there is no evidence that the role of these three ministries in the accumulation and creation of human capital would provide the needed Human Capital for Yemen's leap in to the future, as these obstacles have not been dealt with seriously enough.
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