NN37, May 2006
Special Theme on Education and Training out of Poverty? A Status Report
DFID: POST-PRIMARY EDUCATION AND THE MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS (MDGS)
By David Levesque, DFID, London
Poverty reduction and the MDGs are central DFID priorities. Since 1990, DFID has prioritised support for primary education. This will continue, with priority given to quality universal primary completion ? especially for girls ? in countries off-track towards reaching the education MDGs.But DFID recognises that to achieve all of the MDGs, increased investment is needed at all levels of education. Investment in secondary, tertiary and vocational education, lifelong learning and skills is necessary to strengthen government and private sector capacity, to deliver basic services, and to promote sustainable growth. This is best addressed within a sector-wide approach to development.
DFID?s preferred approach is to support the entire education sector. In collaboration with the international donor community we encourage developing county partner governments to equitably allocate resources across all levels of their education systems in order to meet the MDGs, as part of a comprehensive education plan.
The MDG benefits of investing in post-primary education include economic growth and employment, sufficient numbers of well qualified teachers and health workers, incentives for UPE completion, promoting gender equality and empowering women, and reduction in HIV and AIDS.
DFID already provides support for post-primary education through general budget and education sector-wide support, core funding of multilateral agencies, research funding, support for capacity development, and innovative centrally funded programmes but we are considering ways of expanding this further.
The announcement by the UK Chancellor and the Minister for International Development in Mozambique in April 2006 that the British Government would provide $15bn for education over the next 10 years includes support for the whole education sector. Partner governments are being encouraged to articulate how this money can best be used to meet the MDGs by 2015.
In its response to the Commission for Africa, DFID agreed to support the development of the African Union and NEPAD plans for revitalising higher education, with particular emphasis on science and technology. We plan to make funds available for the implementation of the AU/NEPAD Consolidated Plan of Action for Science and Technology working through the African Science & Innovation Facility and to support higher education through national and regional centres of excellence.
We plan to increase our research budget and use it to encourage the greater participation of developing country partners in research consortia.
We have also developed a new higher education partnership scheme with priority given to support for MDG and science and technology related projects. This will start in May 2006 and is expected to provide funding for up to 300 partnerships over a seven year period.
Finally we will continue to work with all our development partners to encourage lesson learning and MDG-related harmonised support for the whole education sector.