Global Campaign

 

"EVERY CHILD NEEDS A TEACHER" - The Global Campaign for Education

 

G8 Truant on Education Aid

April 2006 - Washington, D.C. - Ministers from countries leading the initiative for universal basic education will speak at the Spring Meetings today, but other G8 donors are noticeably absent while 100 million poor children around the world are denied an education. The Global Campaign for Education (GCE) welcomes the leadership of the Netherlands and the United Kingdom and urges rich country laggards to learn from their example.

Despite numerous promises from world leaders, aid for basic education in poor countries remains low at $2.6 billion per year out of the total $79 billion in foreign aid. An additional $10 billion per year is needed by 2010 to ensure that every child completes a quality primary education.

“Promises must translate into teachers and kids in the classroom,” said Kailash Satyarthi, head of GCE.

The United Kingdom has stepped into the gap today by committing £100 million to the Education For All Fast Track Initiative (FTI), the program at the center of efforts to address this crisis. At their meetings later today and in June and finally at the St. Petersburg G8 summit in July, G8 finance ministers must determine how they will fill the education funding gap.

The spotlight is now on less generous countries to increase the level and quality of their aid to basic education.

 

“Italy, Germany and France scarcely pitch in their pocket change,” said Chikondi Mpokosa, a former teacher from Malawi. “Why, when the rate of return on education is so high, are these countries so miserly? It doesn’t add up.”

A huge proportion of what some rich countries give is lost on tied aid and technical assistance. For instance, 92% of Italian aid must be spent on Italian good and services.

“Rich country leaders are making a mockery of their promises to increase aid by squandering public money on expensive technical assistance including overpaid consultants,” said Max Lawson, policy advisor at Oxfam International. “The same amount of money needed to hire a consultant for 100 days would pay 100 teachers for a year.”

The World Bank and IMF must also escalate their efforts on education. Bank president Paul Wolfowitz should publicly lobby rich countries to contribute their fair share to the FTI based on gross national income and ensure that Bank lending supports primary education in poor countries – especially targetting teachers. Given his commitment to education, Gordon Brown should use his position as chair of the IMF Committee to give poor countries the necessary fiscal space to spend aid and domestic resources on education and end public sector salary caps that keep countries from hiring and paying much-needed teachers.<< M.East PR- read more>>

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