Ghana is highest receiver of aid to basic education, cuts number of children out of school – UNESCO

Ghana received a two per cent share of the total aid to basic education in 2011, the highest share of any individual country in the world, new UNESCO figures show.

The new analysis from the Education for All Global Monitoring Report, published by the UN agency also shows that Ghana has cut the number of children out of school. Between 2004 -2005 Ghana was in the bottom 10 of the countries for out of school children, but current data shows that the country is placed at 13th, a press release on the new report says.

“It also ranks fourth in the amount of progress it has made over the past five years, that is by the number of out of school children,” it adds.

“There were 1.078 million out of school children in 2006, but only 0.564 million by the latest data (from 2011),” it says.

According to the statistics, globally, 57 million children were out of school in 2011; a drop of just two million from 2010.

“Compounding this problem for children around the world is a new data analysis showing that aid to basic education has decreased for the first time since 2002,” it says.

The new figures, it saidd, were released before a high-level discussion in New York on June 11, 2013 in support of the United Nations Secretary-General’s Global Education First Initiative.

The release noted that the statistics highlight the need to tackle the twin crises in education – whether children get into school at all, and whether they learn once they are there.

The statistics show that countries in sub-Saharan Africa account for more than half of all out-of-school children and have the highest out-of-school rate.

According to the analysis more than 20 per cent of African children have never attended primary school or have left school without completing primary education.  By contrast, countries in South and West Asia have made considerable gains over the past two decades, reducing the number of out-of-school children by two-thirds from 38 million in 1999 to 12 million in 2011.

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi