UNICEF applauds Central Asian commitment to improve education

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) today said it was pleased with Central Asian government plans to speed up common education reform in the face of limited resources for investment in the education sector.

"UNICEF welcomes this renewed commitment of education officials from the five Central Asian countries," Yukie Mokuo, UNICEF Tajikistan Representative, said in a statement at the conclusion of a 3-day meeting in Warzob, Tajikistan.

Within the scope of a regional cooperation initiative, delegates from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan met to address critical problems associated with their common education reform plan and the barriers to achieving Education for All (EFA) and Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

Education specialists from the UNICEF regional office and from headquarters also made presentations on Early Childhood Development and Girls' Education.

The forum participants also called on donor agencies to beef up their support, particularly in financing the reform process and they also stressed the need for greater coordination and cooperation among the donor agencies, the UNICEF statement said.

The EFA goals are wider access to early childhood care and education; universal primary education; improved youth and adult learning opportunities; a 50 per cent improvement in adult literacy rates; gender equality; and an improvement in all aspects of the quality of education. MDG is designed to reduce or eliminate a host of socio-economic ills by the year 2015.