improv
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UNDP~~
Global Action Plan:
ing support to countries in
hieving the EFA Goals
U
A basis for enhancing collective effort
among the EFA convening agencies
NESCO~~UNFPA~~UNICEF~~The World Bank
ii
Why a Global Action Plan to achieve the EFA goals?
Education is a key parameter of sustainable human development and is essential for
achieving international development targets. Development entails change of a societal and
individual nature – education and learning of all kinds are key tools in enabling that change
to take place, leading to new possibilities, new horizons and new connections. Thus efforts
to achieve broad development aims and the EFA goals are closely intertwined; achieving
all six EFA goals will play a significant part in reducing poverty and realising the whole of
the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) agenda. Education is also a fundamental human
right and offers the hope that we can fulfil our potential as human beings.
Five multilateral agencies of the UN system – the United Nations Educational, Scientific
and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), the United Nations Development Programme
(UNDP), the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the United Nations Children’s Fund
(UNICEF), and the World Bank – convened the Jomtien World Conference on Education
for All in 1990 and the World Education Forum in Dakar in 2000 and have carried the vision
forward at international level.
Since Dakar, the world has witnessed steady progress towards achieving the EFA goals, in
particular towards universal primary education and gender parity among the lower-income
countries. Nevertheless, progress towards the EFA goals has not been sufficient and fast
enough to meet the target dates, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, South and West Asia,
and the Arab States. The gender parity goal for 2005 has already been missed, and over
80 countries are at risk of not achieving gender parity even by 2015. About one-fifth of the
world’s adult population – an estimated 781 milli