The European Parliament,

–   having regard to the Commission communication (COM(2002) 116 – C5&nbhy;0333/2002),

–   having regard to the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), held in Cairo in 1994, and to the Fourth World Conference on Women (FWCW), held in Beijing in 1995,

–   having regard to the World Summit for Children, held in Jomtien in 1990, the 1995 UN Social Summit held in Copenhagen in 1995 and the World Education Forum, held in Dakar, Senegal, in 2000,

–   having regard to the United Nations General Assembly Special Session on Children, held in New York in 2001,

–   having regard to the International Conference on Financing for Development, held in Monterrey in 2002,

–   having regard to the World Summit on Sustainable Development, held in Johannesburg in 2002,

–   having regard to the World Trade Organisation Development Round, to be held in Cancún in 2003,

–   having regard to its resolution of 6 September 2001 on basic education in developing countries in the context of the United Nations General Assembly Special Session on Children in September 2001(1),

–   having regard to Rule 47(1) of its Rules of Procedure,

–   having regard to the report of the Committee on Development and Cooperation and the opinions of the Committee on Culture, Youth, Education, the Media and Sport and the Committee on Women's Rights and Equal Opportunities (A5&nbhy;0126/2003),

A.   whereas Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights established education as a fundamental human right,

B.   whereas the 1995 Convention on the Rights of the Child has still not been ratified by all the signatories,

C.   whereas, on 10 November 2000, the Commission and the Council issued a Joint Statement which supported the view that there should be a global commitment to universal primary education and identified education as a development priority,

D.   whereas global economic inequalities and the burden of debt have left many governments without the resources required to provide education for all children, and whereas structural adjustment programmes have forced governments to reduce public sector spending,

E.   noting that the Global Campaign for Education has called for spending priorities to be reordered in those countries where military expenditure is high, so as to ensure that education has a greater emphasis in the national budget,

F.   noting that, in 2001, the Commission disbursed 4.1% of the combined general budget of the Commission and of the European Development Fund (EDF) on education in the countries covered by the Development Assistance Committee (DAC); whereas this is much less than it had promised and is at odds with the official aims previously published by the Commission,

G.   noting that, in its resolution of 30 May 2002, the Council acknowledged that donors, including the European Union and Member States, had not increased their education aid as much as was necessary to meet the Millennium Development Goals concerning education,

H.   noting that, in its aforementioned resolution of 30 May 2002, the Council stated that the European Union and Member States would adjust their policies and allocation of resources to reflect the belief that education is central to poverty reduction, the achievement of sustainable development and the construction of democratic, prosperous societies,

I.   noting that little money has been earmarked for education in the National Indicative Programmes (NIP) under the EDF, since few countries chose education as a focal point in their NIP,

J.   noting that not only is the Commission's budget for primary education too small, but that the disbursement of funds is slow and inefficient,

K.   whereas 113 million children have never attended school, whereas another 150 million children start primary school but drop out before they learn to read and write, and whereas 860 million people in the developing world are illiterate,

L.   whereas child labour prevents many children from attending school, since their earnings are essential for the survival of the family,

M.   stressing that human rights, including the right to education, are universal and indivisible and that there is no place for discrimination of any kind on the grounds of sex, disability, race, ethnic origin, religion or culture,

N.   whereas two-thirds of the children who do not attend school are girls, enrolment rates for girls are still behind those for boys, and drop-out rates for girls are higher,

O.   having regard to the vital importance of education and vocational training, especially for girls and women, in combating poverty and disease, and therefore supporting the Commission's political commitment to step up education and training resources in its development cooperation,

P.   whereas education policy in developing countries must address the problems specific to developing countries and, given that procuring energy and water is a task usually given to women and children, access to, and management of, energy and water must form an integral part of the education policies recommended by the European Union, in order to provide a durable improvement to the standard of living and health of informed populations and to promote their economic development,

Q.   whereas the Commission's Communication is to be considered an important step towards attaining the aim of promoting education in the developing countries, and whereas it presents a comprehensive strategy in which objectives are accompanied by priorities, methods and specific measures, such as campaigns to make parents - especially fathers - aware of the advantage of educating girls,

R.   whereas the framework thus presented can be considered satisfactory, albeit poor in proposed actions to promote education and training for girls and women,

S.   noting that emergency provisions for many children who are displaced or affected by conflict, drought or famine rarely extend to appropriate education, even when displacement and instability are prolonged,

T.   stressing the importance of peace education where children are victims of violent conflict, as is the case with children in refugee camps,

U.   believing that tackling the education crisis is one of the most effective strategies at our disposal for breaking the cycle of poverty and is the key to sustainable human development and efforts to make progress towards the internationally agreed 2015 human development targets,

V.   regretting the fact that since the Dakar Conference, there has been minimal progress, the Fast Track Initiative notwithstanding, and, in international efforts to tackle the crisis in education, a lack of willingness to accept coordination; whereas, given current trends, we shall not meet the 2005 target for gender equality in education, particularly in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, and whereas the 2015 target for universal primary education will be comprehensively missed, with an estimated 75 million children not attending school,

W.   welcoming the Fast Track Initiative and the Commission's support of it in principle; regretting, however, that to date, the Commission has not stated what funds it will make available to the countries covered by this initiative,

X.   urging the Commission to ensure that the Fast Track Initiative is quickly extended to other countries, including those which have not yet completed their Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers,

Y.   noting that parents in developing countries make enormous sacrifices so as to enable their children to attend school,

Z.   whereas efforts are being seriously undermined by the HIV/AIDS pandemic, as a result of which 10% of teachers in the worst affected countries in Africa are expected to die over the next five years, and whereas the number of AIDS orphans is predicted to rise to more than 20% of all school-age children,

AA.   whereas sex education in school offers the best prospects for the prevention of HIV/AIDS,

AB.   believing that the classroom experience should be student-centred, relevant to the local community and in the local language and that curricula need to be flexible and relevant to children's lives,

AC.   believing that the achievement of primary education for all is a precondition for more equitable patterns of globalisation and for the closure of the digital divide,

AD.   whereas donors, including the EU, should develop joint guidelines on policy, operating procedures, accounting systems and monitoring and evaluation which ensure transparency, and whereas they should end the practice of tying aid in the education sector to the provision of goods and services,

AE.   noting that, given the capacity constraints faced by developing countries, it is important to set realistic time scales for the production of participatory national education plans,

1.  Emphasises that universal, compulsory, free, public and high-quality primary education, which provides children with at least six years of primary education, is the foundation for an education strategy which encompasses secondary, tertiary, vocational and adult education; emphasises, further, that promoting high-quality primary education, and especially girls' access thereto, should be the top priority of the EU's and Member States' development strategy for education;

2.  Welcomes the Commission's undertaking to propose an increase in total resources for education and training, in particular for the poorest countries and population groups, since this will contribute to ensuring that education remains free of charge without compromising its quality;

3.  Notes that, during the budget negotiations in 2001 and 2002, the European Parliament, together with the Council, stated that Community aid for education had to be increased and noted that specific targets for expenditure on education had been included in regional budget headings; emphasises once again that the budget for education needs to be doubled to at least 8% of the Commission budget for development, and that this increase should not be achieved through substitution but should represent an actual increase;

4.  Calls on the Council to agree to a timetable for Member States to increase their aid to basic education, where they have not already done so, with a view to meeting the commitments they made in Dakar;

5.  Regrets that, with regard to the financing of the proposed programme, the Commission has not set a target; calls on the Commission to set a budgetary target for education, as the budgetary authority did in 2001; deems it imperative to attain the 35% target for social sector spending, including education, which was agreed in 2001; calls for clear time indicators within the current framework between now and 2015, and asks the Commission to submit an annual report evaluating compliance with those indicators;

6.  Calls on the Commission, when it reviews the priorities and targets in the mid-term review of National Indicative Programmes in 2004, to make a concerted effort with the developing countries to allocate money for primary education not only to the NIPs but also to other ACP funds, to increase the focus and target funding on education and to push for more efficient mechanisms for disbursement on education;

7.  Notes that, to date, the Commission and developing countries have not used the dialogue concerning the increase in spending on primary education by the governments of the developing countries to a sufficient extent; urges the Commission to start such a dialogue, with the involvement of Member States, and emphasises that this must not consist in budgetary substitution; calls for concentration on sectoral funding, since substitution is not possible within the sectoral framework;

8.  Urges the Commission and Member States to give preferential support to countries committed to educational strategies encompassing free universal primary provision, gender equality, wide access, high quality, decentralisation of reform, and special support for the poorest and the most disadvantaged;

9.  Urges the Commission to play a greater role in ensuring the complementarity and consistency of the development education policies of Member States and the Union and act as an interlocutor with international organisations such as UNESCO, UNICEF, the OECD and the World Bank; stresses, in this connection, the need for the EU to be given international legal personality;

10.  Urges the Commission and Member States to announce the extent of their support for the Fast Track Initiative as soon as possible; is disappointed that the Commission, which hosted the first Education for All Donor Consortium meeting in November 2002, did not agree to finance the first group of countries;

11.  Urges the Commission and Member States involved to press for the Fast Track Initiative to be opened to all of the 18 pre-selected countries by the end of 2003 and for the Analytical Fast Track Initiative to be opened to all other countries that could benefit from it, not merely to the five high-population countries, regardless of whether or not they have completed a Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper;

12.  Calls on the Commission to establish a scoreboard which will facilitate the tracking of Community and EU bilateral aid to education, in the light of the Dakar commitments and of Member States' commitments to increase the volume of their aid to education;

13.  Welcomes the Commission proposal that budget support be given on the strict condition that the recipient country has a comprehensive Education for All plan; urges the Commission to attach legal guarantees to the budget support, based on public expenditure reviews, and to give it in advance, respecting the "ownership principle";

14.  Calls for reform of IMF and World Bank Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers so as to ensure that they support, rather than undermine, free, public, high-quality education and take account of the specific nature of each situation and region while subordinating technical considerations to the overall objectives of sustainable development and the fight against poverty;

15.  Believes that eligibility for assistance should be contingent on poor countries developing strategies that are capable of providing high-quality education without relying on user fees in any shape or form;

16.  Agrees with the Commission that responsibility for the quality of education should lie with the developing countries themselves; calls for standards to be agreed with those countries for acceptable girls' enrolment and completion rates for each year, with a view to closing the gender gap in primary and secondary education, failing which the Commission will need to consider whether budget support is the most appropriate mechanism for achieving the gender equality Millennium Development Goal in that country;

17.  Emphasises that, if countries do not comply, mechanisms should exist to induce them to do so, including the possibility of budget support being suspended;

18.  Emphasises the importance of Commission and Member State support for the 'Education for All' (EFA) goal of improving adult literacy, especially the female literacy rate, by 50% by 2015;

19.  Stresses, with regard to gender equality, the importance of reliable information and statistics on the education and training of girls and women and supports the Commission's proposal to promote the collection of the relevant data; recalls that the association agreements signed with developing countries and the Union's regional strategies should cover the necessary statistical instruments and exchanges of information;

20.  Considers that, given the importance of women in the local, social and family economy, it is essential to develop training programmes for women and girls leading to qualifications which will enable them to obtain work and to develop local businesses, with the aim of promoting the economic development which will allow these women and their families to escape from the vicious circle of poverty and disease;

21.  Stresses that the education of girls and women must not stop at basic education but must be promoted and developed at the levels of higher education and exchange programmes and that after-school and sports programmes must likewise be open to women and girls;

22.  Welcomes the Communication's emphasis on gender balance and mainstreaming, as well as its recommendation that the number of specialists in education within the Commission's delegations be increased, but considers that they should have undergone training in gender mainstreaming; calls on the Commission to ensure gender mainstreaming and to make available, as soon as possible, the communication on training in the external services which it should have submitted in the first quarter of 2002;

23.  Notes that, since diseases in developing countries principally affect poor communities, perpetuating poverty through work loss, ill-health, school drop-out and increased social and economic instability, this factor should be taken fully into account in all education programmes;

24.  Considers information on education and training programmes available to be an essential part of the success of their implementation and calls on the Commission to pay special attention to ensure that the relevant information reaches women and girls, since education can help to protect them from all forms of exploitation;

25.  Stresses the importance of adapting education to the local culture and mentality, for example by providing Pan-African editions of textbooks and by building schools out of local, inexpensive material;

26.  Stresses, in particular, the importance of education for girls and women in improving sexual and reproductive health, including the prevention of STDs such as HIV/AIDS and illnesses related to water supply and conditions of hygiene such as tuberculosis, malaria, cholera and diarrhoea;

27.  Welcomes the Commission proposal that the connection between AIDS and education be acknowledged, emphasising that education policy and the policy on combating HIV/AIDS and other diseases typically found in developing countries must be complementary and mutually reinforcing, and that their priorities should include reproductive and sexual health and rights, in line with the European legislation in this field, while also taking account of the importance of health and practices in the context of diet and water supplies;

28.  Welcomes the Commission proposal that account be taken of the impact of conflict on children and education, including the circumstances of children in refugee camps;

29.  Believes that special attention must be paid to the reintegration of child soldiers into society and calls on international donors to establish programmes for the re-education of child soldiers;

30.  Attaches, like the Commission, great importance to the involvement of parents and the community in education;

31.  Acknowledges, like the Commission, that there are many different ways in which education may be organised, including use of the private sector, but stresses that the State must guarantee the right of education for all; emphasises that education must be considered a public service even though it may be provided by the private sector;

32.  Broadly endorses the principles set out in the Commission's Common Cooperation Framework for Higher Education, but calls on the Commission, at the forthcoming WTO negotiations, not to allow schooling to be included in the General Agreement on Trade and Services (GATS) as a 'service' that must be subject to free-market rules and productivity criteria, as this would not only seriously infringe the right of all to education but could also seriously restrict public education which, since it is necessarily supported by government funding, would be likely to be considered in breach of the rules on free competition;

33.  Emphasises that teachers deserve adequate remuneration and should not be replaced by volunteers, that they have the right to form professional associations and to undertake collective bargaining, that no international body should impose salary scales on their profession and that a greater number of female teachers needs to be trained; believes that teachers are entitled to good initial and in-service training, with refresher courses also focused on their specific needs;

34.  Emphasises the need to provide a working environment for teachers and pupils that is healthy, safe, secure and conducive to learning;

35.  Believes that Community development aid for education will only be effective if it forms part of a broader development policy which sets the reduction of poverty as its chief goal;

36.  Urges that account be taken of the specific needs of indigenous people in the Union's policies, especially in the areas of education, the fight against poverty, food aid and sustainable development; calls on the Commission to make available the necessary resources to improve the protection of indigenous cultures and to enable the indigenous peoples to control their own development and collective identity and combat the forms of discrimination that affect them, especially through the expansion of primary education in the local languages in conditions similar to those applying to an official language of the territory concerned;

37.  Emphasises, in this connection, the need to promote school books and teaching materials, the content of which is based on the regional cultures concerned, written whenever possible in the predominant regional languages and relevant to local agricultural, economic and social interests; also emphasises the need to develop curricula specific to the region and establish language and teacher training in the relevant regional languages;

38.  Points out that primary education must be designed to suit the local situation, for instance by means of mobile schools in sparsely populated areas;

39.  Emphatically underlines the positive role that information and communications technologies, whether Internet, e-mail, mobile phones or the traditional radio, television, newspapers and magazines, can play in all areas and at every level of education, and calls on the Commission and Member States to encourage their use more strongly than they have so far;

40.  Draws particular attention, in this context, to the great potential of the radio medium, which in large parts of Africa, particularly, is still the most widespread medium and by which even remote areas can easily be reached, to convey agricultural, economic know-how, promote the empowerment of civil society and health education, especially the prevention of HIV/AIDS, as well as reaching the people who are unable to read and write; hence, calls on both the Commission and Member States to give this area greater financial and creative attention;

41.  Calls on the Commission to foster quality control of education through support for national inspection systems in developing countries;

42.  Calls on the Commission to foster dialogue between Ministers of Finance and Education, teachers' unions and parental organisations in developing countries;

43.  Calls on the Commission and Member States to harmonise their education programmes within each developing country, with the coordinating role being given to one of them, and to ensure that financing, monitoring and follow-up activities are complementary;

44.  Emphasises that 'education for all' not only means an increase in enrolment rates, but also an increase in completion and achievement rates;

45.  Emphasises the importance of supporting projects for street children which provide them with accommodation in which they can wash themselves, sleep and learn, even if they continue to live on the street and survive by accepting menial jobs, so as to enable them to have a minimum of education and social and cultural skills, thus improving their prospects;

46.  Points out that decisive advances in the education sector will only be secured if compulsory schooling is successfully enforced, which would rule out the possibility of 'exemption' in return for payment;

47.  Points out that universal full-time education requires an effective ban on child labour as well as an education system that includes strategies to integrate all working and other out-of-school children into full-time schooling; calls on the Community to ensure that all education programmes financed by the Community have far-reaching strategies which include social mobilisation and bridging courses for older children;

48.  Calls on the Commission, the developing countries and the private sector to establish a system whereby child labour would be discouraged as much as possible and in which provision would be made in every case for part-time education;

49.  Underlines the need for all educational institutions to impart democratic values, to promote active citizenship and to foster a sense of responsibility towards others;

50.  Calls on the Commission to report back to Parliament on the progress made one year after the adoption of this resolution;

51.  Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Council and the Commission.

(1) OJ C 72 E, 21.3.2002, p. 360.