Ei-iE

Education International has joined civil society organisations to lead a regional workshop on education financing for trainers in Malawi. The training is part of a programme to build capacity among Education for All (EFA) coalitions.

The five-day workshop was opened on 9 August by Malawi’s Minister of Education Science and Technology, the Hon. Dr. George Chaponda. In his opening remarks he said that he was glad to be associated with this collective action between Lesotho, Malawi, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe which reflected these countries’ serious concern for quality education.

“Quality education is a catalyst for development,” Chaponda said, before adding that increased financing of education was crucial if EFA goals were to be achieved by 2015.

The Minister expressed his regret that most developing countries will not meet the EFA goals by 2015 due to a lack of resources and, partly, because development partners have not met the pledges that they made in Dakar in 2000. “I want to take this opportunity to remind those who made promises to meet them,” he concluded.

The Education Financing Workshop is jointly organised by EI, the Global Campaign for Education, the Africa Network Campaign on Education for All, and ActionAid International (AAI).

The training is based on a toolkit developed by EI and AAI as a result of the Parktonian Agreement reached in 2006. The participants are expected to organise national level training which will culminate in a campaign for increased financing of education in their respective countries.

Participants from the teachers’ unions stand alongside EI colleagues, and national coalitions, as well as the Minister of Education (front centre) and civil society officials