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1 million Pakistani children out of school: Unesco
January 30, 2014
ASMA GHANI
ISLAMABAD - Though, more children than ever are going to school, but it is now a certainty that the ‘education for all’ goals will not be met by the 2015 deadline, in large part because the disadvantaged have been left behind.
The goal of universal primary education is likely to be missed by a wide margin, as 57 million children were still out of school in 2011 worldwide. It is projected that by 2015, only 68 out of 122 countries will achieve universal primary enrollment.
The UNESCO released its annual education report here on Wednesday. The study ‘Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2013-14’ looked at the state of learning among the youth - children between the ages of 15 and 24 - in some 37 countries.
The report says that Ethiopia and India have contributed significantly to the overall reduction in out of school numbers but places Pakistan in the list of 14 countries that are likely to have more than 1 million children out of school as the country does not have the recent data on out of school children publicly available. It says that in Pakistan rich boys and girls are expected to complete primary school by 2020 but on recent trends poor boys will reach this fundamental target only in the late 2050s and poor girls just before the end of the century.
“It is unacceptable that 25 countries, including Bangladesh, the Central African Republics, Congo and Pakistan - most of which are still a long way from achieving EFA - dedicates less than 3 per cent of Gross National Product (GNP) to education. It is particularly worrying that some countries that were already spending a small proportion of GNP on education, such as Bangladesh have reduced their spending further.”
Pakistan, home to 10 per cent of the world’s out of school children, cut spending on education from 2.6 per cent of GNP in 1999 to 2.3 per cent in 2010, the report said.
It recommends that the countries need to raise 20 per cent of their Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in taxes to achieve Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
“In Pakistan, tax revenue is just 10 per cent of GDP and education receives only around 10 per cent of government expenditure. If the government increases its tax revenue to 14 percent of GDP by 2015 and allocated one-fifth of this to education, it could raise sufficient funds to get all of Pakistan’s children and adolescents into schools,” said the report.
Roughly 250 million children in the world’s poorest nations could not read part or all of a sentence. Most of the children came from Arab states, Sub-Saharan Africa or South and West Asia. Furthermore, in roughly one-third of those countries, less than 75 percent of school staff members were qualified to teach, the study says.
The report also found that, in addition to low enrollment rates with 120 million primary school aged children having little or no experience with school, many of the nations surveyed were losing billions by failing to address education problems.
“The cost of 250 million children not learning the basics is equivalent to $129 billion, or 10 percent of global spending on primary education,” the report said and estimated that governments would have to recruit 1.6 million more teachers in order to achieve universal primary education by 2015.
1 million Pakistani children out of school: Unesco
January 30, 2014
ASMA GHANI
ISLAMABAD - Though, more children than ever are going to school, but it is now a certainty that the ‘education for all’ goals will not be met by the 2015 deadline, in large part because the disadvantaged have been left behind.
The goal of universal primary education is likely to be missed by a wide margin, as 57 million children were still out of school in 2011 worldwide. It is projected that by 2015, only 68 out of 122 countries will achieve universal primary enrollment.
The UNESCO released its annual education report here on Wednesday. The study ‘Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2013-14’ looked at the state of learning among the youth - children between the ages of 15 and 24 - in some 37 countries.
The report says that Ethiopia and India have contributed significantly to the overall reduction in out of school numbers but places Pakistan in the list of 14 countries that are likely to have more than 1 million children out of school as the country does not have the recent data on out of school children publicly available. It says that in Pakistan rich boys and girls are expected to complete primary school by 2020 but on recent trends poor boys will reach this fundamental target only in the late 2050s and poor girls just before the end of the century.
“It is unacceptable that 25 countries, including Bangladesh, the Central African Republics, Congo and Pakistan - most of which are still a long way from achieving EFA - dedicates less than 3 per cent of Gross National Product (GNP) to education. It is particularly worrying that some countries that were already spending a small proportion of GNP on education, such as Bangladesh have reduced their spending further.”
Pakistan, home to 10 per cent of the world’s out of school children, cut spending on education from 2.6 per cent of GNP in 1999 to 2.3 per cent in 2010, the report said.
It recommends that the countries need to raise 20 per cent of their Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in taxes to achieve Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
“In Pakistan, tax revenue is just 10 per cent of GDP and education receives only around 10 per cent of government expenditure. If the government increases its tax revenue to 14 percent of GDP by 2015 and allocated one-fifth of this to education, it could raise sufficient funds to get all of Pakistan’s children and adolescents into schools,” said the report.
Roughly 250 million children in the world’s poorest nations could not read part or all of a sentence. Most of the children came from Arab states, Sub-Saharan Africa or South and West Asia. Furthermore, in roughly one-third of those countries, less than 75 percent of school staff members were qualified to teach, the study says.
The report also found that, in addition to low enrollment rates with 120 million primary school aged children having little or no experience with school, many of the nations surveyed were losing billions by failing to address education problems.
“The cost of 250 million children not learning the basics is equivalent to $129 billion, or 10 percent of global spending on primary education,” the report said and estimated that governments would have to recruit 1.6 million more teachers in order to achieve universal primary education by 2015.
1 million Pakistani children out of school: Unesco
