BANGKOK CONFERENCE ON EDUCATION FOR ALL URGES INCREASED POLITICAL WILL AND FUNDING
Bangkok (Thailand), January 21 {No.2000-04} - Greater political will and funding for basic education in the Asia-Pacific region should be the bedrock for a
regional education strategy for the 21st century, said an education review
conference of these countries which ended in Bangkok on Thursday.
The January 17 - 20 Asia-Pacific Conference on Education for All (EFA) 2000
Assessment was attended by 41 government ministers from the region and a
total of 500 participants. It closed with the adoption of a draft Framework
for Action. It aims to ensure quality learning for every child, youth and
adult without discriminating between boys and girls, rich and poor, towns
and villages.
UNESCO Director-General Koichiro Matsuura who closed the conference declared
that he was determined to make basic education "an absolute priority during
my term as the head of UNESCO." He urged Asia-Pacific nations to learn from
the review of educational progress that preceded the Bangkok conference and
show the "political commitment to follow up." (read full text in PDF format)
The draft action plan adopted yesterday will be debated at the national
level before it is finalised as a regional EFA strategy, which, in turn,
will feed into a global Framework for Action which is expected to be adopted
at the World Education Forum in Dakar, Senegal (April 26 - 28).
While calling on national governments and international donors to provide
greater political support for basic education through increased funding, the
Conference emphasised the need to create a "new space" for civil society.
"The lack of resources is often a matter of political will, both within
national governments and among international funding agencies," said the
draft document which advised "both partners" to step up national budgets for
education, development assistance and debt relief for poor nations.
Mr. Matsuura spoke of UNESCO's integrated vision of the social, ethical,
economic, environmental and cultural roles of education. This approach, he
said, "prizes knowledge above all as the gateway to individual human dignity, to
self-awareness and self-fulfillment. It [...] steps beyond a narrow vision
of education as instruction or as a single set of job-oriented skills that
cannot help the individual respond and adapt in a rapidly changing social
and economic environment."
The national reports tabled in Bangkok show that while most children are now
in school, a high proportion drops out without completing basic schooling.
Girls and young people in remote areas are the worst hit.
Mr. Matsuura said that goals could not be achieved by relying on the
traditional school system alone as this leaves out a large proportion of
people. "An education that caters to the most marginalised, that is
pro-active on gender issues, that successfully balances the demand for both
quantity and quality of provision, is the most reliable signal of a
flourishing society."
Echoing a proposal made in the draft Regional Framework for Action, the
Director General said that information technology holds the key to taking
education further and wider in the new century.
The Conference was jointly organised by the five convenors of the
International Consultative Forum on Education for All: UNESCO, the United
Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the United Nations Children's Fund
(UNICEF), the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the World Bank, as
well as the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the United Nations Economic and
Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP).
It was one of six regional conferences taking place around the world in the
run up to the World Education Forum. Their aim is to assess progress
achieved in providing education for all ten years after the international
community pledged, at the Conference on Education for All in Jomtien
(Thailand), to eliminate illiteracy and provide basic education for all by
the year 2000.
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