THE European Union (EU) says it is targeting to spend about $80 million sourced under the Education Transition Fund to upgrade the country’s education sector over a five-year period ending in 2015. REPORT BY KUPAKWASHE MAKONYE OWN CORRESPONDENT
In a statement, the EU said the ETF which started running in 2011, disbursed about $12 million last year and $25 million was earmarked for this year.
“The ETF agreement runs until 2015 and is in line with the Medium Term Plan (MTP) of the Ministry of Education, Sport, Arts and Culture for the education sector. The ETF therefore is the Government of Zimbabwe’s investment strategy for the education sector (2011-2015) and is cost at $80 million,” reads the statement.
UNICEF was identified by the Ministry of Education and development partners as the most suitable partner to manage the ETF funds in the absence of direct budget support to the ministry.
Although UNICEF continues to manage the ETF funds, the Ministry of Education leads the ETF and all programme funds are agreed and approved jointly with them ministry through an ETF steering committee which is chaired by senior officials of the Ministry of Education.
“There is an acute shortage of teachers in developing countries. For example, to achieve universal primary education an additional 1,7 million primary school teachers are needed by 2015.
“EU is making efforts to improve levels of literacy in the EU through its ‘Europe Loves Reading’ campaign. In addition the European Commission is also at the forefront of action to tackle the problem in the world’s developing countries.
Since 2007, the Commission has invested 4 billion euro on education and literacy in 48 partner countries, enabling more than 9 million pupils to enrol in school and more than 720 000 primary teachers to receive training,” part of the statement reads.
