South Sudan urged to increase funding for education
The transitional unity government has been urged to increase annual budgetary allocation too education by Martin Tako Moyi, the deputy minister for general education and instruction.
“While government allocations to education have grown in recent years, they remain underutilized, resulting in lower domestic investment in education than recommended internationally,” Moyi said during the review of General Education Sector Plan.
Government is reviewing the 2023/27 General Education Sector Plan as a commitment to achieve the 2030 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
“Despite the growth in the number of schools in our country, reaching nearly 6000 schools in 2021, and a rise in learners to 2.2 million, the expansion has not kept pace with the growth of school age children,” Moyi said in Juba on Tuesday.
Moyi revealed that school enrolment rates have only seen marginal improvement from 2015 to 2021, adding that approximately 2.6 million children are out of school, representing about 60 percent of the population aged 6 to 17.
“A shortage of qualified teachers is affecting the quality of instruction in our classroom. A significant percentage of teachers in pre-primary, primary and secondary education do not meet the required qualifications,” he said.
