$8 million granted for basic education [Archives:2003/691/Local News]

The donor community granted Yemen last week $ 8 million to support basic education. The grant was announced in the Partnership Conference held in Oslo during the period 19-22 November. “In that meeting a catalyzed fund has been initiated and Yemen got $ 8 million for the year 2004,” Minister of Education, Dr. AbdulSalam al-Jawfi told Yemen Times, adding that “the grant is for basic education, mainly to increase and encourage girls enrollment in schools.”
Yemen started in 2001 Basic Education Expansion Project (BEEP) with support from some donors. The project aims, according to the minister, to increase school enrollment of girls and fill the gap between rural and urban areas, improving the quality of teaching. If Yemen makes use of the recent fund in a good way, extra fund will channeled to the basic education expansion. “The donors working for supporting the project promised to increase their fund for education in order to achieve Education for All strategy by 2015,” al-Jawfi who attended the event said. The project is now targeting some governorates and if it will need around $100 million to cover the entire country.
Yemen is now a member of the Fast-Track Initiative (FTI). The FTI is a program that is intended to catalyze and initiate funds for countries that have strategies aiming to achieve education for all and are best able to use grants effectively for this purpose. The FTI is supervised by the World Bank and other donors.
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