Reaching the marginalized: EFA global monitoring report, 2010; 2010

PROGRESS TOWARDS THE EFA GOALSEstimating the cost of achieving Education for AllEstimating the costof achieving Educationfor AllThe Dakar Framework for Action includes strongcommitments on education financing. Developingcountries pledged to ‘enhance significantlyinvestment in basic education’ (para. 8[i]), while richnations promised an increase in aid, mainly in theform of grants and concessional finance, to ensurethat ‘no countries seriously committed to educationfor all will be thwarted in their achievement of thisgoal by a lack of resources’ (para. 10).Ten years later, finance remains a major barrierto Education for All. Developing countries havestepped up their efforts to make domesticresources available, albeit on an uneven basis.Many could do much more to raise theirinvestment in education by strengthening revenuecollection and equity in public spending. Theinternational community has also increased aidfor basic education, but collectively donors havefallen far short of delivering on their commitmentsmade in Dakar.This section assesses the scale of the Educationfor All financing gap. It sets out the results of acosting exercise covering forty-six low-incomecountries. 49 The exercise looks at the financingrequirements for achieving a range of goals in basiceducation and beyond. Among the key findings:The financing gap is far larger than previouslyassumed. Even with an increased domesticresource mobilization effort, low-incomecountries face a financing gap of aboutUS$16 billion for basic education (literacy,pre-primary and primary education),representing 1.5% of their collective GDP. 50This is a third higher than the previous estimate.Factoring in lower secondary education wouldincrease the gap to US$25 billion.Low-income countries need to strengthenefficiency and equity in education financing.There is considerable scope for making moredomestic resources available by improvingrevenue collection, giving education a higherpriority and focusing more on basic education.Increased revenue collection and greater equitycould enhance domestic financing for basiceducation by about 0.7% of GDP. This representsUS$7 billion, or two-thirds of current levels ofspending in the countries included in the study.Several countries have the potential to doublethe share of GDP allocated to basic education.Exploiting that potential should be part of theEducation for All contract between developingcountries and donors.Aid donors need to undertake a ‘Gleneagles plus’aid commitment. Aid levels for basic educationin the forty-six countries covered need to risesixfold from their current level, fromUS$2.7 billion to US$16 billion. 51 Even ifdonors act on the commitments made atthe 2005 Group of Eight summit in Gleneagles,Scotland, and substantially increase aid tothe poorest countries, the level will still fallUS$11 billion short. An emergency pledgingconference should be convened to mobilizethe additional financing required.Reaching the marginalized requires additionalfinance. Failure to take into account the costsassociated with reaching marginalized groupshas contributed to systematic underestimationof the financing gap. It costs more to extendeducation opportunities to the mostdisadvantaged than it costs to reach better-offhouseholds. The new study estimates thatadditional measures to extend primary schoolopportunities to social groups facing extremeand persistent deprivation will costUS$3.7 billion annually.The revised Education for All financing gappoints to challenges for both aid recipients anddonors. Developing countries need to increasethe level of ambition for public spending ineducation at a time when slower economic growthis putting budgets under pressure. Most majordonors, for their part, are gripped by recession andrising fiscal deficits. Some are cutting aid budgets.Others are reviewing future commitments. As thesepressures mount, it is important that governmentsrecognize the crucial role of education investmentsin creating the foundations for recovery and futurepoverty reduction efforts.Part 1 of this section sets out the cost estimatesand the assumptions behind them. Part 2 presentsthe findings on the Education for All financing gap.Ten years afterDakar, financeremains a majorbarrier toEducation for All49. Full details of themethodology and resultsof the study are available in(EPDC and UNESCO, 2009).50. These figures relate toaverage financing gaps andGDP levels in low-incomecountries between 2008and 2015.51. Chapter 4 reports thatannual aid commitmentsto basic education averagedUS$4.9 billion in 2006and 2007 (see Figure 4.7).The low-income countriesincluded in this costingexercise received 55% ofthose commitments andUS$2.7 billion of total aid tobasic education. Chapter 4shows that low-incomecountries received 60% ofall aid to basic education,but the figure includes somesmall countries excludedfrom the costing exercise,as well as India, whichthe OECD-DAC defined asa low-income country atthe time of writing.119