WRITTEN QUESTION E-2171/00

by Salvador Garriga Polledo (PPE-DE) to the Commission

(7 July 2000)

Subject: View taken by the EU as regards the action framework for universal basic education

After the World Education Forum held last April in Dakar (Senegal), the UN and the World Bank reached an agreement on an action framework intended to provide funding for poor countries which submitted a plan for basic education by 2002.

The purpose of the agreement is to try to provide universal basic education by 2015 by involving over 180 countries, together with donors, the UN and a strong, active coalition of NGOs, who will henceforth be essential partners in the campaign to provide education for all.

What view does the EU take of the attempt to provide universal basic education by 2015? How does the EU intend to contribute to the combined worldwide effort agreed at the Dakar Forum?

Answer given by Mr Nielson on behalf of the Commission

(19 September 2000)

Provision of basic education for all is an indispensable component of the poverty reduction strategies. The Community places the fight against poverty and the integration of developing countries at the centre of its support to sustainable development.

The Commission is ready to support national education action plans aimed at achieving the post-Dakar targets. As decided in the framework for action adopted in Dakar, the Commission looks forward to monitoring with partner countries and all donors the progress towards the year 2015 and intermediary objectives. It will work with the United Nations organisations, with non-governmental organisations (NGOs), and with partner countries to advocate and promote the objectives laid down by the Forum, and in particular girls' and women's education.

The Commission made determined efforts to give development issues, in particular support to social sectors including education, top priority at the G7-G8 Summit held in Okinawa on 19 July 2000, in line with the commitment that the Dakar framework for action objectives are taken into consideration at each international conference and summit.

Within this context, the Community is decided to contribute, with its Member States, to any initiative taken by the World Bank, to provide funding for developing countries monitoring or implementing national plans for the support of basic education. One of the priorities of the poverty reduction strategy papers (PRSPs) launched by the World Bank, in cooperation with other donors, including the Community and its Member States, is support to basic social services.

The Commission has already significantly increased its financial commitments to basic education in developing countries over the past years, especially in Asia, in the Mediterranean countries, and in the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries (within the Lome framework).

The policy statement on Community development co-operation identifies, among the priority fields for concentrating Community activities, support to macroeconomic policies with an explicit link to poverty reduction strategies and in particular sector programmes in social areas (health and education).

The newly concluded partnership agreement between the Community and the ACP presents support to social policies as one of its major strategic elements, together with support to economic growth and productive sectors, in the overall context of poverty reduction. Support to basic education, to broader access to disadvantaged groups, especially women, and to better quality, with adequate financial resources, is clearly underlined in the new partnership agreement.