The 1980s saw an educational decline which eroded many of the gains of previous decades.
Teachers are demotivated and often badly paid, classrooms are in disrepair.
In some countries parents are forced to choose which of their children are to be educated. The goal of free education for all still seems a long way off. There is still a huge gap in spending on education between the developed and the developing world. But this global figure masks the dramatic fall in education spending in sub-Saharan Africa during the 1980s. In Asia and the Arab world expenditures per pupil rose in the 1980s, but more slowly than in the previous decade.