Why educating girls is even more important than people realise

THE LAST time the Taliban ruled Afghanistan, they banned girls from going to school. This time they say they will allow them to be educated “within the limits of Islam”. No one knows what that means. Afghan women fear the worst. As the men with guns in Kabul ponder whether to allow their female compatriots to study, it is worth reflecting on why this matters so much.

Development experts do not agree on much, but they all agree that educating girls is one of the most effective ways to ease all manner of social ills. (Boys’ education matters too, but girls have further to catch up.) When girls learn how to read, write and do sums, they lead longer, healthier lives. They are much less likely to become child brides or teenage mums and are also less likely to suffer domestic violence. If all women completed primary school, the number who die in pregnancy and childbirth would fall by about two-thirds.

Educating girls is also an excellent way to reduce poverty. This should be obvious—if half the population never learn much, they will never earn much. Women who finish secondary school can expect to earn twice as much as those who never enter a classroom. A degree of financial independence, in turn, gives them more bargaining power in their relationships with fathers, brothers and husbands who might seek to push them around.

Women who spend more time in school generally choose to have smaller families. This is the main reason why the global fertility rate has fallen from five children per woman in 1960 to 2.5 today. In very poor countries, uneducated women may have lots of babies, because they expect some of them to die young, and the family wants extra hands in the fields. If women are educated, however, they have fewer children so they can afford to keep them in school for longer.

The children benefit enormously: they are more likely to receive vaccinations and less likely to die before they grow up. If all women finished secondary school the number of child deaths would fall by half, and 12m fewer children would suffer from stunting caused by malnutrition. Children born of educated mothers are much more likely to get a good education themselves, and use it to snag a good job. So are their children—it is a virtuous circle. A recent study of eight emerging economies by Citigroup and Plan International concluded that making sure all girls finish secondary school would boost GDP in those places by an average of 10% within a decade. And places that educate girls end up with more female politicians, which can improve governance. Female legislators are typically more supportive of health and education spending, and less keen on big armies.

Despite these benefits, many countries continue to neglect girls’ education. Few go as far as the Taliban, who have been known to throw acid in bookish girls’ faces. But in poor countries only about 80 girls complete lower secondary school for every 100 boys. And the pandemic has made matters worse. Many countries have closed schools for months. Millions of girls whose education was interrupted will never go back, having been married off or sent out to work. It is not just in Afghanistan that girls’ potential is being wasted.