2007-10-15
OTTAWA — The Honourable Beverley J. Oda, Minister of International Cooperation, accompanied by Mr. Khalil Shariff, CEO of Aga Khan Foundation Canada, today increased Canada’s commitment to improving Afghanistan’s education system through the Foundation’s Girls' Education Support Program (GESP). The contribution will directly benefit more than 100,000 girls and 4,600 teachers. The Minister made this announcement while participating in a student forum at Ottawa’s Joan of Arc Academy.
“After years of conflict and insecurity, Afghanistan’s education system is one of the weakest in the world. This has deeply affected the country’s ability to rebuild and sustain itself,” said Minister Oda. “But progress is being made, and Canada continues to reinforce its role as a leader for education in Afghanistan, particularly for women and girls.”
"This program will build on the Aga Khan Foundation’s many years of experience and expertise strengthening access to and the quality of education in some of the most impoverished parts of Africa and Asia, often in partnership with Canada and Canadian institutions," said Khalil Z. Shariff, Chief Executive Officer of Aga Khan Foundation Canada. "At the same time, our objective is to strengthen the ability of Afghans, from parents and children to government and institutions of civil society, to rebuild the education sector at all levels."
The GESP will help address many of the needs identified in the Government of Afghanistan's Five-Year National Education Strategic Plan. These include early childhood education, investing in improved teacher training for women, distance education, secondary education for girls, and improvements to school facilities. The GESP will be implemented by the Aga Khan Foundation Canada – a trusted partner with a proven track record in Afghanistan.
Canada’s New Government will invest $8 million in this initiative, which complements a commitment of $60 million to the Education Quality Improvement Project (EQUIP), Afghanistan’s largest education initiative. Minister Oda announced EQUIP funding on October 4 with visiting Afghan Minister of Education, His Excellency Haneef Atmar. Canada’s commitment to the initiative is the largest made to the program by any donor to date.
Today’s announcement is part of Canada's total contribution of $1.2 billion over 10 years aimed at governance, security and development in Afghanistan. It builds on the commitment made by Prime Minister Stephen Harper last February, when he announced substantive funds to accelerate the reconstruction and development process.
For more information on Canada’s programming in Afghanistan, please refer to CIDA's website.
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Information:
Jean-Luc Benoît
Director of Communications
Office of the Minister of International Cooperation
Telephone: (819) 953-6238
Media Relations Office
Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA)
Telephone: (819) 953-6534
E-mail: info@acdi-cida.gc.ca
Web site: www.cida.gc.ca (electronic version of document)
Backgrounder
Supporting Education in Afghanistan
Access to an education opens up a world of potential. Over the past few years, Afghan parents have been investing in their country’s future and prosperity by sending their children to school in unprecedented numbers. The Afghan government recently reported that more than six million children are enrolled in school this year, including more than two million girls. This stands in stark contrast to 2001, when only 700,000 children attended school, all of them boys.
While this significant leap in school enrolment is a major milestone, there is still room for progress. Afghanistan continues to have some of the lowest educational indicators in the world, including large gender gaps and high rates of illiteracy for women and girls.
In an effort to help the Afghan people address such gaps, Minister Oda announced on October 15, 2007 that Canada will contribute $8 million to the Girls Education Support Program (GESP). Implemented by the Aga Khan Foundation Canada, the GESP will promote the enhancement of girls’ education through activities such as the establishment of early childhood development and women’s literacy classes, improvements to teacher training, the provision of scholarships to adolescent girls for secondary schooling, and the rehabilitation of schools to facilitate girls’ access.
Canada’s contribution to the GESP announced today is in addition to our current assistance to Afghanistan’s education sector, which includes:
Investing $60M in the Education Quality Improvement Project (EQUIP), which helps build educational facilities and human resources, with a special emphasis on promoting girls’ education (announced by Minister Oda on October 4th 2007);
Funding the work of BRAC Afghanistan to deliver basic primary education for some 120,000 children (almost 85% of them girls) and to train 9,000 teachers (at least 4,000 of them women);
Contributing to the Afghanistan Reconstruction Trust Fund, which provides regular salary payments to more than 270,000 civil servants, including 144,000 teachers; and,
Supporting UNICEF’s literacy program in Kandahar province, which is assisting literacy centres and teachers, and delivering literacy training to thousands of Afghans, most of them women.
