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In an all parties conference on February 5, 2008, 16 political parties had signed a joint declaration on "Education For All" (EFA), which called for over 10 percent budget allocation for education sector. EFA is an international movement and Pakistan is signatory to the EFA Declaration and it has promised to achieve EFA targets by 2015.

The EFA targets included early childhood and care, primary education for all, life skills, 50 percent increase in adult literacy rate, elimination of gender disparity in education and improving quality of education. It has been internationally recommended that governments should spend at least four percent of their Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on education. Unfortunately, during the last 10 years, Pakistan has annually spent less than two percent of GDP on average.

During a seminar organised to mark Education For All Week on Wednesday, parliamentarians, policymakers, scholars, educationists and students applauded the government step for discarding two standards of education prevailing in the country. Addressing on the occasion, Federal Minister for Education Ahsan Iqbal said the discrimination in education system could lead to the worst educational apartheid.

Within two years, the ministry would build up the capacity of the government schools up to the international standard so that the elimination of other systems could not affect the system negatively," he said. New education policy: Iqbal said the draft of the new education policy had been prepared which would be finalised after discussions with different segments of society.

We are planning for a two-day national education summit in which literary personnel, educationists and scholars from all across the country would be invited for consultation over the draft," he said. Iqbal said till the end of May the draft would be presented in the National Assembly, which would pass it after debate.

The leaders of all political parties would sign the draft so that it could not be amended for at least next ten years," he said. Iqbal said it was a knowledge revolution era and there was a need to design the curriculum according to new standards and demands. Our curriculum and education system should enhance the creativity of the students as it is an era of inventions and innovations," he said.

One girls school in each union council: Iqbal also said the government would establish at least one girls school in each union council to provide equal opportunities of education to females besides providing incentives to the teachers. Book reading: Department of Libraries Director General Chaudhry Muhammad Nazir said that it was pitiable that the habit of book reading was declining day by day.

Special attention of the government is required to take concrete steps to create awareness about the significance of book reading," he said. Nasir said the government should focus on establishing more libraries to increase the habit of book reading among youth. The parliamentarians present on the occasion included Nuzhat Amir, Pervaiz Khan, Liaquat Mangal Zai and Shakeela Rasheed. They stressed the need for political stability in the country for the success of the government policies. A book fair was also organised on this occasion to mark World Book and Copyright Day.

Books related to different areas of life were displayed in the exhibition. Home Islamabad Share this story!

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