EDUCATIONAL AGENCIES IN AFRICA: WORKING TOWARDS OPTIMAL IMPACT

Addis Ababa, 15 January 2014 – The African Union Commission, through its Department of Human Resources Science and Technology (HRST) held a day-long meeting of Education Development Agencies on 15 January 2014 at the AU Commission in Addis Ababa.

The discussion brought together partners and concerned members of the United nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization  (UNESCO), Economic Commission of Africa (ECA), Association for the Development of Education in Africa (ADEA), Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA), and  also participants from the Russian embassy, United States of America, France, Germany and India.

The meeting is a way to find common grounds that will help Africa to get better education by bringing the stakeholders at national, regional, bilateral and multilateral levels together to share their experiences and to also identify the areas of intervention, knowing the basic components i.e. the teacher, the learner, the content and learning conditions.

The educational agencies are looking to develop a policy which drives and coordinates the teachers’ training, the building of the infrastructure and getting funding for equipment, text books, and information and communication technologies (ICT). They are also discussing ways to distribute resources using the many partners around the world that technically and financially develop African countries in the aspect of education. However some of the countries are receiving very little support or no support.

During his presentation Dr. Martial De-Paul Ikounga, Commissioner for Human Resources Science and Technology at the AUC said that a way has to be developed that would leave no country behind. He also stated how databases and statistics can be collected from stakeholders and a directory can be made for anyone who needs to use or collect the information.