Turkmen Government, UNICEF and UNESCO hold discussions on the global Education for All initiativeAshgabat, Turkmenistan, 23 February 2005 – Today the Government of Turkmenistan, UNICEF and UNESCO held a joint round table on the global framework of Education for All (EFA), involving various governmental institutions, NGOs, and bilateral agencies working in education. This global initiative came into existence in April 2000 in Dakar, Senegal, where all the participating countries, including Turkmenistan, expressed their commitment to the overall principles and goals of Education for All. As stipulated in the Dakar Conference, EFA aims to ensure access to education, quality of education and learning achievements such as numeracy, literacy and life-skills knowledge. Therefore, this initiative is closely linked with the Millennium Development Goals, which Turkmenistan like other nations as well strives to achieve. This national round table is held to unify under one framework all the organisations in relation to educational issues and define national priorities and major areas of concern for further elaboration of an Action Plan to implement EFA nationwide by 2015. In his opening speech to the participants, Mahboob Shareef, UNICEF Representative in Turkmenistan, emphasized: “Education for All is a multisectoral framework. This is why it is important all education related organisations in the country sit together and identify common and interlinked needs and priorities for improving access and quality of education as part of implementing the Convention on the Rights of the Child.” The meeting was attended by a wide range of institutions including Ministries of Education, Social Welfare, Health, Economy and Finance, Institute of Education, National Statistics Institute, Mejlis, Youth Fund, Women’s Union, Economist Union, US Embassy, UNFPA, IOM, and UNHCR. One of the main objectives of the round table was to promote national understanding of the EFA magnitude and provide overall guidance and expertise for further development of the Action Plan. Mr. Reza Samarbakhsh, Education Programme Officer of UNESCO, stated: “This meeting is the first step for the EFA implementation and happens in the country for the very first time gathering various institutions to discuss education within one single framework, thus underscoring the multisectoral nature of EFA. This is a major achievement.” As a result, the participants to the meeting identified a set of priorities and starting points to be built upon such identification of indicators for EFA planning and implementation, improving curriculum and content for better education quality, promoting science and technology, improving school health and encouraging life-skills education. The round table as well defined needs in capacity building through training, sharing of experience, indicator development and stressed out the importance of international expertise, in particular support from UNICEF and UNESCO. At the end, the participants of the round table expressed their interest in applying EFA principles and goals in Turkmenistan. For information and comments, please contact UNICEF Communication at: +99312 425686
|
