At the 1990 World Conference on 'Education for All' in Thailand, governments adopted a plan to achieve universal primary education by the year 2000. Zambia pledged to achieve this goal by 2005, but is likely to fail because recurrent expenditure in schools is not budgeted for. Primary education is in urgent need of reform.
Enrolment is low with figures actually decreasing.
It also favours boys above girls and better-off children from urban areas. There are too few schools and existing buildings are dilapidated whilst staff pay is inadequate, morale is low, and learners are underachieving. The supply side of education is deficient because the Zambian government simply cannot pay for improvements. Zambia is heavily burdened with debt repayments. Debt servicing regularly exceeds spending on education and social services combined.