EI calls on donors to respect GPE pledges
EI welcomes the renewed commitment and energy shown at the Global Partnership for Education (GPE) Pledging Conference, held on 8 November in Copenhagen, Denmark, towards a revived education compact. It simultaneously laments the ambition as we have yet to see the serious increase in aid to education from all donor governments at the level pledged by civil society and developing countries.
Nevertheless, there are a few clear leaders, with Australia - pledging $278 million over 4 years - and the UK - £352 million over 4 years. In total there was approximately $1.5 billion pledged by donor governments, $500 million by civil society and $2 billion by developing countries,to achieve Education for All (EFA) goals.
EI General Secretary, Fred van Leeuwen, was particularly “disappointed by the underperformance of the World Bank, whose aid to education is at an all-time low for the last 20 years – delivering only about a third of what they provided in 2010, and so far failing to deliver on the promise made by President Zoellick to increase aid to basic education for which they received such warm praise last year.”
In his pledge at the conference, he stated: “EI is uniquely positioned to not only deliver on our pledge, but also monitor and advocate for GPE donors and partners to make good on their pledges. In donor countries our members advocate for governments to contribute their fair share to the partnership, and in partner countries we advocate for domestic investment and transparent use of GPE funds.”
He concluded by reaffirming: “There is no other group more aware of the importance of our Education for All goals than the global teaching profession.”
Monique Fouilhoux, Chair of the Global Campaign for Education (GCE), a coalition of civil society organisations working towards achieving EFA, and EI representative, further emphasised: “We are here to remind donors that promises to children should never be broken – yet many have continued to do so for every year since 2000: when they pledged to ensure that no country would be unable to educate their children for lack of finances.”
She went on to say: “Whilst we welcome today’s commitments of $1.5 billion over three years, we urge donors to try harder. There are still more than 60 million children out of school – and none should be left behind.”
In the civil society zone, EI organised a panel with UNESCO, GCE and Oxfam Novib, to discuss a comprehensive strategy for closing the professional teacher gap in low income countries and urged all GPE partners to work towards improving teaching and learning conditions for all.
Mr. van Leeuwen’s full speech at the Pledging Conference is available here
