Position Paper
Working Group for Basic Education and Child Labour
Poverty & Development Unit
G8 2008 NGO Japan Forum“We reaffirm our commitment that no government seriously committed to achieving
education for all will be thwarted in this achievement by lack of resources.” (G8COMMUNIQUÉ OKINAWA 2000)
Why is aid for basic education needed?
Basic education refers to education that fulfils the fundamental learning need of humanbeings, and that consists of early childhood development, primary education, lower secondary
education and life skills education including adult literacy. Basic education is significant in
two respects. First, basic education is a right itself. The right is identified as a universal rightin the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) and the Convention on the Rights of theChild (1989). When children are out of school and adults are unable to read and write, theses
are violations of a fundamental human right. Therefore, nations and international community
have a duty to ensure basic education for all the people.
Secondly, education is a necessary means for economic development and poverty reduction.
At the Genoa Summit in 2001, Mr. Koizumi, then prime minister of Japan, introduced the“Spirit of one hundred sacks of rice (Kome hyappyou)1” and stressed the importance ofhuman development for the prosperity of a country. It is demonstrated in the experience ofEast Asian countries, including Japan, that universal primary education was the pre-condition
for economic development accompanying equality. Moreover, basic education contributes topoverty reduction, as well. For example, the HIV infection rate of women who havecompleted primary education is half the rate of those who have not. Also, the child mortality
rate decreases 9 % in the case of the former compared to the latter. This fact leads to theestimate that about there would be a 0.7 million decrease in HIV infected youth and 1 million
more infants would survive if universal primary education were achieved.
77 million children are out of school and 781 million adults cannot read and write.
Today, 77 million children of countries which data is available are out of school and 781
million adults can not read and write. Among those, women compose two thirds. Dangerous
labour takes away children’s rights from 218 million children. Goal 3 of the United Nations
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), that is, to “eliminate gender disparity in primaryand secondary education preferably by 2005, and at all levels by 2015”, failed in 2005 to beachieved in one third of the developing countries. UNESCO has estimated that the MDG 2, to“ensure that all boys and girls complete a full course of primary schooling by 2015”, is likely
not to be achieved in 67 countries if the present level of progress continues.
1"Spirit of the one hundred sacks of rice"
At the beginning of the Meiji period, the desperately impoverished Nagaoka fiefdom received one hundred sacks ofrice as relief aid. One of the leaders of the clan, Torasaburo Kobayashi, counseled that if they just distributed the riceto the fiefdom's samurai and residents, the rice would be gone in a few days. Instead, he proposed to use the rice tosecure funds to build a school, and thus to increase one hundred sacks of rice to thousands or tens of thousands sacksof rice in the future. The plan was carried out, and, as a result, a steady stream of valuable human resources wasproduced by the school. This foresight is called the "spirit of the one hundred sacks of rice" in Japan, and itemphasizes that investment in education is one of the most vital investments for nation-building.
http://www.mofa.go.jp/region/africa/education3.html#1

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The gender gap in education is serious and accelerates the "feminization of the poverty" orpoverty being a problem for women. At first, because of the custom of adhocracy thatremains in many areas in the world, particularly when education can be a burden to thehousehold expenses, girls are in a position where their attendance of school is given the least
priority, and they are first to be withdrawn from school among their family members.
Whether one takes on an education just reinforces the disproportion of power relations
between men and women, and supports violence based on gender. In addition, female experts,
particularly professionals in the health and medical care sector, are few compared with that ofmale experts, because the gender gap in secondary and higher education is even bigger. It is
often the case that women are put to work in inferior working conditions even if they are able
to get jobs at all. For instance, female nurses have to treat the blood of patients withoutrubber gloves being provided at a hospital in an area where HIV infection is about a concern.
It is imperative for poverty reduction and the dissolution of the gap that the viewpoint of
women engaging in “care labour”, the economic contribution of which is not acknowledged
often, is be reflected in decision-making of the society. However, it is difficult for the
viewpoint of the women to be reflected in policy without their expression of opinion being
possible, because they often do not receive education. As a result, the immobilization of thegender gap is taking place.
The international community affirmed that “no government seriously committed to achieving
education for all will be thwarted in this achievement by lack of resources” in the Dakar
Framework for Action in 2000, and developed countries, the G8 countries in particular, madenecessity of an increase of the basic education support clear. “EFA fast track initiative (FTI)”,
that is, international fund mobilization mechanism to realize this pledge, began from 2002.
However, the amount of real aid is only 4.4 billion dollars though the amount of necessary aid
fund is estimated at 11 billion dollars a year to achieve the EFA target.
Efforts of developing countries’ governments: Abolition of school fee
The achievement of the EFA target is critical, as mentioned above. However, the achievementof EFA target is possible in terms of both ability and funding. Many developing countries
made an effort and accomplished the following big developments over a short term:···

In Burundi, as a result of having exempted tuition from students of primaryeducation, 500,000 children newly enrolled in schools on the first day.
In Bangladesh, the primary school enrolment rate of girl roses to the double that of
the whole country in the area where a scholarship for girls from the government was
introduced. .
In Lesotho, children infected with HIV used to drop out of schools, but with theabolition of tuition fees and the introduction of school meals, many HIV positive
children returned to school.

The reason why these countries achieved those results is because the government executed
system reforms, such as the abolition of tuition fees, and incentive provisions, such as
scholarships and school meals, on a large scale: The government was not just satisfied withsmall-scale pilot projects. These examples show that the achievement of EFA is possible if
the government wrestles with political intention. The abolition of tuition fees, in particular,
has achieved a big effect. Fourteen African countries and Cambodia and East Timor in Asia
abolished tuition fees after 19942.
2

The14 countries that abolished tuition fees are as follow: Malawi (1994), Ethiopia (1996) Ghana (1996) Uganda
2One year after the abolition of tuition fees, the school enrolment rate increased 68% in
Malawi and Uganda, and 22% in Kenya, as the graph below shows. The countries thatabolished tuition fees use more than 20% of the national budget on education. Education
expenditure rose to 40% of government expenditure after tuition was abolished in Kenya in
2003.
It is whether factors obstructing enrolment to school can be cleared that greatly controls
whether a country can get closer to the achievement of the EFA target. And it is the role of thedeveloped countries to support the efforts of developing countries effectively.

Source：School Fee Abolition Initiative (2006)
The role of the G8
More: Is the G8 aid for basic education enough?
The graph below shows a comparison of the amount of aid to primary education to Africancountries from G8 countries in 2005. The graph compares the shared fairly amount of aid in
the field of basic education of 5 billion dollars that African countries needed based on thewealth of each G7 country with the amount of real aid for African primary education. The
graph indicates that, except U.K. and Canada, G7 countries do not provide fair share of aid
amount for universal primary education in Africa.
U.K. and Canada as active countries· The U.K. has announced to support 15 billion dollars in ten years until 2015 forbasic education in predictable manner.
· Canada has increased the amount of aid to education by four times compared withthat in 2000 and has pledged to increase the amount of annual bilateral aid in thefield of education for African countries to 130 million dollars by four years after.
Germany, France, U.S.A., Japan and Italy as passive countries· Germany used to focus on higher education but in later years expands primaryeducation support. The amount of the annual target of primary education support
after 2007 is 153 million dollars.
(1997) Lesotho (1999), Cameroon (1999) Madagascar (2002), Tanzania (2002), Zambia (2002), Kenya (2003) Benin(2004), Mozambique (2005), the Democratic Republic of Congo (2005), and Burundi (2005).

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·

·
·
·

The contribution degree of France to the fair share was 40%. France is shifting toprimary education, but the most assistance to education is still to higher educationand scholarship for university students from students. Such support does notcontribute to the development target of the education sector of the developing
countries directly.
The amount of aid of U.S.A. is far below the needed amount of money. The budget
bill in 2008 reduces about 25% of assistance to education in comparison with the2006 budget.
The contribution degree of Japan to the fair allotment was 27%. The ratio of theamount of basic education support to Japanese education assistance is only 18%.
Until now, Italy has not announced a plan to increase primary education support toAfrica.

Actual amount committed and the amount of fair share for Universal Primary
Education in Africa (2005)
102

UK
Canada45
64

Germany

54

France

152

133
95

38

USA

468

149

Japan

248

68

Italy

17
0

77
100

200

300

400

500

US$ Million
Amount of fairly shared aid based on GNI to Education in Africa
Actual amount of bi & multi aid to Education in Africa

Source：DATA (2007)
0.7% aid target and debt cancellation
It is necessary to increase the total sum of ODA itself so that an increase in basic education
support does not sacrifice support for other important development sectors. The ratio of the
ODA of G8 countries to the total Gross Domestic Income (GDI) ratio was 0.33% in 2005. Inorder to achieve the international target of “0.7%”, it is necessary for all G8 countries tomake a road map to achieve 0.7% target within a specific year.
Debt relief helps the short supply of funds. The reason is because liquidation strongly
suppresses the education budget. The Dakar Framework for Action mentions, “providing
earlier, more extensive and broader debt relief and/or debt cancellation for poverty reduction,with a strong commitment to basic education”. Twenty-nine countries that had became object
countries in the expanded debt relief initiative for heavily indebted poor countries (HIPCs)
were able to increase basic education budgets. For example, Tanzania could increase its
4education budgets per capita to double by debt relief and was able to abolish tuition fees. As aresult, 1.6 million children were able to enrol in school. Niger allocated 40% to primaryeducation among the funds, which no longer have to be paid back due to debt relief.
However, the debt relief carried out so far has been too small-scale and intended for only alimited number of countries. At the G8 Gleneagles summit in 2005, it was agreed that “thedebt of the country where the debt was a hindrance in achieving MDGs would be exempted”
for the first time, and debt cancellation of HIPCs was decided. However, there are many
countries that have not been endorsed as HIPCs, though under the same above-mentioned
conditions. The number of countries needing debt cancellation for achieving the MDGs
amounted to nearly 60 countries in total. The Sub-Saharan African countries spent a sum
equal to double of the budget for fundamental social services (health, education, etc.) for
liquidation in 2003. In order to achieve the MDGs, it is necessary for the debt of all countries
needing debt cancellation to be exempted, and not only some countries chosen arbitrarily.
On the occasion of debt cancellation, it is necessary for the creditor nations to pay attention to
two issues. First, policy conditions that obstruct achievement of MDGs should not be made.
The creditors have imposed economic liberalization, the reduction of the public expenditure,
the privatization of the public sector and a market opening on the debt countries asconditionalities for the debt forgiveness. The World Bank that had aggressively promoted
these conditions has recognized that these policies brought the expansion of poverty and gap
in many developing countries. Secondly, debt cancellation should be performed separatelyfrom and additionally to existing aid pledges. Most donor countries presently appropriate
debt cancellation in the ODA budget. This means that part of the aid budget disappears byfund transfer between the ministries and government offices of the creditor nation. As a result,the amount of aid received by the subject developing countries decreases and thosedeveloping countries and the poor suffer from the side effects.
We call upon the G8 countries to:
1. Announce a road map to achieve the UN target that 0.7% of GNI is allocated for
ODA.
2. Increase basic education aid to meet their fair share of US$11 billion annual externalfinancing requirement, particularly on low-income countries where per capita
education expenditure is low.
3. Cancel the debt of countries at risk of not achieving MDGs without imposing
negative conditionalities or reducing current aid flows.
Faster: Accelerating EFA through Fast Track Initiative (FTI)The EFA fast track initiative (FTI) was formulated by an agreement of the G8 in 2002 as amechanism to aid countries, giving priority to those with a reliable clear plan for achievementof the EFA and a will to carry out the plan. The characteristics of FTI are mainly three. First,
ownership by the developing country government is respected, and aid that is consistent with
the national educational program is carried out not led by the donor but by the recipient
government. Secondly, the aid harmonization would be promoted, and the transaction costson the part of the developing country’s government is to be reduced. Thirdly, the aid forordinal/recurrent expenses (teachers’ salaries, textbooks etc.) is strengthened. In FTI, all
low-income countries may become endorsed countries if the condition is met that there isan approved poverty reduction strategy paper (PRSP) and an education sector development
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program endorsed by the donor at a country level.
The aid to the FTI-endorsed country is executed through bilateral and multilateral aid to thefield of basic education and two FTI funds: the Catalyst Fund and Education Program
Development Fund. As of 2006, the capital needed for universal primary education in the 20
FTI-endorsed countries was 51.3 billion dollars. And of this, the developing countries’
governments contributed 3,536 million dollars. The amount of aid demand was 1,118 million
dollars, but the real aid amounted to 604 million dollars and was 513 million dollars wereshort.
The list below shows a ratio of the real amount of aid to the FTI endorsed countries to: 1) theamount of each bilateral aid for the FTI endorsed country, 2) the two funds of FTI, and 3) the
total of the two, which should be contributed based on the wealth (GNI) of the G7 countries
when the amount of contribution among those countries is fairly shared, from 2003 to 2005.
Other than U.K. and Canada, no country performed well.
Commitment to FTI by G7 countries (2003-2005)④Fair share of②Amount
finance requiredcommitted to
Amount③Totalto fill the①Amount theDonorcommitted
amountfinancing gap
GNI as % committed FTI-endorsed
Rank Country
as % of faircommitted for the FTI
to FTI fund countries
of totalshare
to FTI（①＋ endorsed
DAC GNI US$ Million bilateral aid to②）
countries, based ③/④%
basic education
on GNI.
US$ Million
US$ Million
1
Canada
3.4%
21
180
201
75
268%
2
UK
7.0%
133
192
325
154
211%
3
France
6.5%
0.00
91
91
143
64%
4
Japan
14.4%
0.00
157
157
317
50%
5
Germany
8.6%
0.00
89
89
189
47%
6
USA
38.1%
0.00
100
100
838
12%
7
Italy
5.4%
1
9
10
119
8%

Source: OECD (2006), FTI Secretariat (2006)

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We call upon the G8 countries to:
4. Report on progress on the commitments in the Heiligendamm G8 Communique,which promised to fill the 2007 financing gap of US$500 million of EFA Fast Track
Initiative, by mapping country-specific financing gaps against G8 country
programs and identifying the potential to scale-up within existing bilateral efforts.
5. Admit and rectify the failure to date to fulfil the promise that no country seriously
committed to “Education for All” will be thwarted in their achievement of EFA
goals by lack of resources.
6. Agree to back an annual replenishment framework for the FTI Catalytic Fund,which responds appropriately to the urgency and scale of the need without
undermining the fundamental principles and practices of FTI.
7. Establish a G8 Task Team within the FTI Partnership for generating political will
for the benefit of FTI.
Better: Improving aid effectiveness
The G8 should employ four policy measures to improve the quality and effectiveness of aid
to basic education. First, they need to improve the predictability of aid. Aid to education isdifferent from aid to infrastructure, including the construction of ports and roads because
education spending requires recurrent expenditure such as teachers’ salaries and textbook
costs. UNESCO estimates that 18 million new teachers are needed to provide primaryeducation to all children by 2015. Governments are not able to decide on employing newteachers with just a one-year increase in aid to education, because firing teachers once they
are employed is not easy. The same logic is applied to the abolition of school fees. It isdifficult to charge school fees once abolished. Therefore, to support abolishing school feesand employing new teachers, G8 countries should improve predictability in aid delivery.
Second, aid to basic education should include recurrent costs in addition to capital cost.
Eighty to ninety percent of the education expenditure of developing countries is recurrent
expenditure, and 10 to 20 percent of it is capital. The majority of aid to education by Japan,
the US and Germany goes to project aid, which supports capital costs and results in the
failure to address important issues such as school fees and teacher recruitment andemployment. However, some argue that support for recurrent expenditure increases aid
dependency and undermines the aid absorptive capacity, which lead to misuse of aid money.
In our view, the FTI mechanism is created to avoid these excuses because the FTI
endorsement process requires that countries must have a good plan and capacity. Therefore,
G8 countries should support recurrent expenditure in education of FTI endorsed countries.
Third, G8 countries should improve aid effectiveness. Most G8 countries pay a lot to
consultants but not so much to the low salaries of teachers. The World Bank estimates that
one-third of aid amounts to education by all donors go to consultancy. In Mozambique,donors pay US$350 million to consultants, whereas the total amount of 100,000 public
servants’ salaries is only US$ 74 million. Technical assistance is necessary to support
institutional capacity building. However, the G8 should reconsider the balance between
technical assistance and grants from the viewpoint of cost-effectiveness. The G8 also should
fully untie aid to improve aid effectiveness. Untying aid allows governments to contact thebest and cheapest agencies through competitive biddings. G8 countries, except for the UK,7still tie part of the aid, where procurement of goods and services must be made from thedonor countries’ agencies.
Fourth, G8 should ensure its accountability and transparency. Donors always impose
accountability and transparency on recipient governments regarding the use of aid money.
However, G8 should also ensure accountability and transparency for citizens in developing
countries and taxpayers in donor countries. One of the promising measures to improve
accountability and transparency of aid delivery is to support the capacity of civil society
organizations working for EFA in developing countries, which monitors the status of EFA
achievement and aid flow and its effectiveness at the grassroots level. Therefore, G8 should
endorse the “Civil Society Education Fund” proposed by the Global Campaign for Education,that one percent of both bilateral and multilateral aid to education should be used for capacity
building of civil society organizations for EFA.
We call upon the G8 countries to:
8. Expand support for recurrent expenditure in basic education, and promotesector-wide approaches and budgetary support in a long term and predictablemanner.
9. Untie aid to improve aid efficiency and ensure aid reaches those who are most in
need, including marginalized populations.
10. Expand support for capacity-building of civil society organizations working for
advocacy in EFA.
Education aid in humanitarian crisis andconflict-affected fragile states
Amongst 77 million children missing out on
primary education, more than half – 39 million –live in conflict-affected fragile states (CAFS). In
CAFS, one in three children is out of school.
Despite this, almost half of all education aid has
been allocated to middle-income countries, whilst
the proportion being channelled to CAFS remains
seriously lower.
Reasons for the low prioritisation of education aid
to CAFS are weak government capacity andefficiency. Although there is a significant proportion of aid to CAFS, it is not just for
education. When looking at aid allocations for social development in CAFS, the proportion ofsocial infrastructure and services receives 43%, compared to only 12%allocated for education.
In low-income countries, 30% is funded for education. Education aid is a low priority in the
low-income countries, in particular CAFS; thus, fair aid allocations are critically important inorder to meet the EFA goals.
In addition, education has been sidelined in the field of international humanitarian assistancefor emergencies and reconstruction aid. It is therefore essential to position education as animportant component of humanitarian aid and ensure active support for education in
emergency situations or/and early stages of post-conflict. Particularly in the context of8emergencies, it is urgently needed to enhance education assistance undertaken by various
donors and aid agencies, and to meet minimum standards for education in emergencies,
chronic crises and early reconstruction3.
We call upon the G8 countries to:11.

Increase long-term, predictable aid for basic education in conflict-affected fragile
states.
12. Prioritize education in humanitarian policy and response and comply with the
Minimum Standard for Education in Emergencies, Chronic Crises and Early
Reconstruction.

Child labour hinders universal primary education
Child labour is defined by ILO Minimum Age Convention (No. 138), which prohibits
employment of children before the completion of compulsory education. The Worst Forms ofChild Labour Convention (No.182) also defines “the worst forms” which are hazardous anddetrimental work by children under 18. The International Labour Organization (ILO)
estimates that 218 million children are engaged in child labour, of which 100 million engage
in hazardous work.
Child labour is one of the biggest impediments in achieving universal primary education. The
study shows a negative correlation between child economic activity and school attendance,
indicating that work is one of the factors lowering school enrolments (UnderstandingChildren’s Work, 2006). Overall child labour has decreased from 2000 to 2004, with a drop in
Asia and larger drop in Latin America, but the number has increased in Sub-Saharan Africa asshown in the graph.
(Million)
2000
2004% change from2000 to 2004
Child Population
1,531.4 1,566.3
2.3
Of which: economically active children
351.9
317.4
-9.8
Of which: child labourers
245.5
217.7
-11.3
Of which: children in hazardous work
170.5
126.3
-25.9
(ILO 2006)
The largest number of children is engaged in agriculture, including fishing and foresting. In
fact, one study shows that one-third of children from cacao farms have never been to schoolin four countries in West Africa (IITA, 2002). It is also reported that factors that strongly
affect the likelihood of primary school attendance are poverty, rural residence, region ofresidence, and gender (Education Policy Data Center, 2007). Child labour is closely relatedwith the MDGs (ACE, 2006).

The Minimum Standard for Education in Emergencies, Chronic Crises and Early Reconstruction(MSEE) was formulated in 2004 by international organisations, such as UNICEF, UNESCO, UNHCR,World Bank and NGOs.
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An education policy that addresses different factors, such as child labour, girls, minorities, thephysically challenged, is needed, particularly to areas where the progress of spreading basic
education is rather slow.
Child Labour and the role of G8 and Japan
In the communiqué of the Genoa Summit inEconomically active children by region
2001, G8 countries stated, ”We will also
work with the International Labour
Organisation (ILO) to support efforts to fightchild labour and we will develop incentives
64%
26%
to increase school enrolment”, and, thus,
7% 3%
2004
(122 million)(49.3 million)
acknowledged the grievance of the child(13.4 million)
labour issue. At the end of 2005, the Global(5.7 million)
Task Force for Child Labour (whose
constituencies are ILO, UNICEF, UNESCO,
23%
60%
9% 8%
2000
(127 million)(48. million)
World Bank, Global March against Child
Labour) was launched, and it emphasized the(18.3 million) (17.4 million)
importance of policy coherence among
0%
20%
40%
60%
80%
100%
international organizations, as well as within
Asia and the Pacificthe developing country itself. Such efforts
Sub-Saharan Africa
have been made, yet the child labour problem
Other regions
has not been solved. It is important that G8
Latin America and the Caribbian
countries admit that child labour digresses
achieving universal primary education and
the MDGs, and therefore more consideration should be given to child labour in bilateral andmultilateral international cooperation.
Inadditiontoadopting
fundamental instruments on
childlabour,ILO
helps
implementing projects throughInternational Program on the
Elimination of Child Labour(IPEC) in 86 countries. The
annual budget is $55 million to$60 million, and since 2002, theprogram supported 5 million
children. The program has
effectively addressed childlabour with a focus on
prevention, eradication andprotection, along with astrategic and comprehensive
approach.

Countributions to IPEC by G8 countries (1991－2006）(1 million US dollars)
Japan

0.56

Italy

12.32

Canada12.57

Germany
FranceUnited Kingdom
United States
0.00

65.97
13.91
27.92
214.1550.00 100.00 150.00 200.00 250.00

Programs in IPEC are funded by contributions from 30 donor countries. The amount ofcontributions is one of the indicators for measuring efforts that each country has made. The
graph shows the total amount of contribution made by G8 countries since the inception of
IPEC. Compared to other countries, the contribution from Japan is extremely small.
ILO aims to eradicate the worst forms of child labour by 2016, and is requesting member
countries to plan a Time-Bound Program (TBP) by 2008. So far, 20 countries have announces10

their TBP, including the target year of achieving their goal. U.S. and Germany have started
giving support to developing countries in the planning and implementation of the TBP. We
request Japan, as well as other G8 countries, to reinforce financial support to those countries
that have formulated their TBP, so that TBP can enhance its effect.
We call upon the G8 countries to:
13. Recognize that child labour is one of the major obstacles to achieving universal
primary education completion and reducing poverty; therefore, the international
community should commit to the eradication of child labour as a matter of urgency
and dedicated action.
14. Promote inter-agency coordination and alignment in education aid and child labour
policy through the strengthening of existing mechanisms, including the Global Task
Force for Child Labour and Education.
15. Encourage partner countries to employ integrated national approaches in policy andpractice on child labour, education, and poverty alleviation so that efforts havegreater impact and relevancy.
16. Act on ILO Convention 138 and 182 to prohibit, prevent and eliminate child labour,by increasing support to national and grassroots programs through bilateral aid,
contribution to multilateral agencies, and partnerships with the private sector.

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