Nobel Peace laureate, Malala Yousafzai, said if just eight days of fund spent by world leader in purchasing military hardware could be diverted to education, it could ensure 12 years of free primary and secondary education to every child in the world.
The 17-year-old Pakistani education activist made this remark while addressing delegates from 40 countries at an education summit in the Norwegian capital Oslo.
“Books are better investment in our future than bullets. The sum of 39 billion dollars each year may appear a huge number, but the reality is that it is not.
“The issue is not that there is not enough money, the issue is the lack of commitment from the world leaders to invest in education,'' Malala said.
Malala was shot in the head by Taliban militants three years ago because of her campaign for the right of girls to education.
At the conference, Norwegian Prime Minister, Erna Solberg, announced that Chile, Indonesia, Malawi and Norway along with the head of the UN agency UNESCO launched an international commission on improving funding for education. “Funding has dropped since 2010. Key areas included ensuring the education of girls, the quality of learning and teaching, and education in emergencies,'' Solberg said.
UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon, approved the commission at the same conference, noting that 2 per cent of humanitarian aid should go to education in crisis areas. The commission's recommendations are expected to be presented in 2016.
The commission is headed by Former British prime minister and now UN special envoy on global education .Brown said about 59 million children worldwide are still out of primary school, while another 65 million do not get secondary education, while 500 million girls will not finish school.
Universal primary education is one of the UN millennium development goals (MDGs) adopted in 2000. Later this year, the UN planned to launch new global benchmarks, sustainable development goals, for the coming 15 years.
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