HANOI - Vietnam's literacy rate has risen to 92 percent compared to 88 percent in 1990, a report said on Monday. The Vietnam news cited National Anti-Illiteracy Committee statistics which put literacy rates at among the highest in both the developing and developed world. The committee attributed the success to efforts by the armed forces and women's groups, especially in remote areas.

A person is deemed literate if he or she has completed three years of primary school, the paper reported. However an official from UNICEF in Hanoi told AFP that to achieve true literacy, students need to complete at least five years of primary school. She also noted that while the overall average of literate people has increased, serious weakness in Vietnam's primary education exist in remote and mountainous areas.

In many villages there are no schools or teachers and children have to walk long distances to attend schools in larger towns, she said. She noted that the lack of teachers is a particular problem in minority areas where children cannot understand Vietnamese, the language of instruction. Some two million people attended Illiteracy Elimination Classes in the past seven years, with 925,000 new people learning to read and write, the paper reported.

Vietnam has a population of 76 million. (AFP)