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UK Urges donors to double aid for Education
1 December 2005
International donors must double aid for basic education so primary school age children across the world can get a full seven years of quality learning whatever their families' income, UK International Development Minister Gareth Thomas said today.
Speaking in China, where he today chaired an international meeting of The Education Fast Track Initiative (FTI), he highlighted a funding gap of $500 million for the coming year for supporting education in 16 FTI-supported developing countries.
In September the UK itself committed an additional £40 million to help fill this gap, from its overall pledge to spend £1.4 billion on education in developing countries in the next three years.
International donors agreed to increase their efforts to raise funding for schooling in another 24 countries by 2007. This will require US$2.3 billion a year.
Gareth Thomas said:
"This will help to get every child into school in the 40 countries, helping
to abolish school fees in the process, and will make a huge difference to
lifting millions out of poverty. International donors now need to make the money
they've promised available."
"After the agreement to double aid achieved at Gleneagles in July by the Prime Minister and the debt relief by the Chancellor of the Exchequer we need to translate these commitments into tangible progress for the poorest people in the world."
Gareth Thomas also reminded donors of their commitments to help developing country governments end school fees and pushed for this to be achieved by 2008.
Speaking on World AIDS Day, he said: "Education is the best prevention against the advance of AIDS. The longer girls in particular stay in school the less likely they are to be infected."
Additional Information
The FTI was set up in 2002 to help donors and developing governments reach the UN's target of getting all primary school age children into schools by 2015. The FTI currently includes the following 16 countries: Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, the Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guyana, Honduras, Kenya, Madagascar, Mauritania, Moldova, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Niger, Vietnam and Yemen.
1. At the meeting in China, Gareth Thomas, chaired a meeting of education representatives from Africa, Asia and the Middle East.
2. In addition to supporting the Fast Track Initiative, DFID provides bilateral support to education programmes in over 30 developing countries, mostly in Sub-Saharan African and South and West Asia. DFID helps governments to develop their own education plans to get more children into school by removing user fees, providing books and equipment, building new schools, paying teacher salaries and providing teacher training.
3. At the G8 Summit hosted by the UK at Gleneagles member countries agreed to provide an additional $50 billion a year by 2010 to all developing countries, including an extra $25 billion a year by 2010 for Africa. The UK also helped to secure debt relief worth up to $55 billion for 18 of the world's poorest countries.
