Education must remain a priority for global development, says Akufo-Addo
As the recently appointed domestic financing champion of the Global Partnership for Education, President Akufo-Addo sought UNESCO’s co-operation and support “to work towards developing sustainable home-grown financial solutions”
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has charged member states of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to ensure that education remains a priority in the common development agenda of countries.
As the recently appointed domestic financing champion of the Global Partnership for Education, President Akufo-Addo sought UNESCO’s co-operation and support “to work towards developing sustainable home-grown financial solutions, so we can develop the educational system for the future we want in our various countries”.
Addressing the 215th meeting of the UNESCO executive board on Monday (10 October 2022) in Paris, France, the president noted that the world does not have the luxury to pick and choose which crises it wants to fix.
“At this moment, we cannot pick and choose between funding guns and education. We cannot pick and choose between the interests of the present generation and the future of our girls and boys. We cannot choose geopolitical concerns over preserving our cherished cultural heritages, lest we perish universally,” he said.
The president said that due to global instability, however, education has become one of many competing priorities of domestic budgets, with development aid to the education sector also seriously under pressure.
Effect of COVID on education
“Indeed, countries reduced their spending on education after the onset of the COVID-19, and, at the same time, direct aid to education by bilateral donors fell by some US$359 million, which is not compatible with the objectives of the Addis Ababa Action Agenda for financing sustainable development and the goals of the [Sustainable Development Goals],” the president said.
“We are further informed that prospects for reaching funding targets through voluntary contributions are uncertain, as several long-term donors have already reduced significantly their voluntary contributions to UNESCO due to a change in development co-operation priorities, thereby significantly impacting our planned programme implementation,” he said.
President Akufo-Addo commended UNESCO for the lead role it played, in spite of these challenges, in ensuring the success of the Transforming Education Summit, held on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in September this year.
Necessitated by the seminal Futures of Education report from UNESCO, the Transforming Education Summit and, indeed, the pre-summit held in Paris have been extremely successful in getting the world to reflect deeply on the trajectory of education systems and how to address the challenges of our time, the president said.
Touching on the Global Priority Africa Programme, which was adopted by the UNESCO General Conference at its 41st session, President Akufo-Addo expressed delight that UNESCO has put Africa top of its international agenda. UNESCO’s flagship programmes are relevant to achieving the chief objective of the Africa Union’s Agenda 2063, he said: “the Africa We Want”.
Fight against climate change
The president also urged UNESCO’s executive board to help in the fight against climate change, especially as the planet is fast approaching a tipping point as a result of global warming.
In pursuit of this, he commended UNESCO for its efforts to strengthen the “Man and Biosphere Programme”, whose goal is to help protect nature and minimise biodiversity loss globally through the Biosphere Reserve Concept.
“I urge UNESCO member states to strengthen measures, at their respective national levels, that recognise formally the contribution of biosphere reserves, and designate more biosphere reserves and geoparks as a sure way for solving the climate crisis,” Akufo-Addo said.
In his concluding remarks, the president informed the executive board that Accra has been named the UNESCO World Book Capital for 2023, making Accra part of the prestigious World Book Capital Cities Network.
This, he said, acknowledges the giant strides Ghana and Africa are making in developing Ghana’s book and creative arts industries.
“The year-long programme to celebrate this honour done us by UNESCO will commence from 23rd April 2023, which is celebrated globally as World Book and Copyright Day. I wish to use this opportunity to invite you all to join Ghana in this year-long celebration,” President Akufo-Addo said.
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