GPE is thrilled to welcome President Nana Akufo-Addo of Ghana as champion for domestic financing for education, calling for increased investment, efficiency and equity in national funding for education.
In this role, President Akufo-Addo will promote the Heads of State Declaration on Domestic Finance, adopted in July 2021 and endorsed by 20 Heads of State to date. These commitments account for US$200 billion over five years to help girls and boys learn. Former President Uhuru Kenyatta of Kenya was the architect of the Declaration in his role as co-chair of GPE’s Global Education Summit in July 2021.
In the Declaration, Heads of State of GPE partner countries commit to allocating at least 20 percent of their annual public budgets to education, and to promoting equity, efficiency, improved learning outcomes, and increased support to teachers.
Domestic financing is the most significant and sustainable source of financing for education, representing around 60 percent of education resources in lower-income countries. Diverse and innovative leadership, such as the new role by President Akufo-Addo, is vital to tackle the education crisis, made worse by the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on economies and budgets around the world. Globally, countries are not spending enough on education, and what they spend is not shared equitably, leading to poor learning experiences for the most marginalized children.
President Akufo-Addo will advocate at the highest levels of government in GPE partner countries to promote the volume, equity and efficiency of domestic resources for education.
"In the current context of recurrent – and competing – crises, it is crucial to prioritize education and allocate sufficient resources to the sector. The future of our nations depends on it. This is why I welcomed the request by the Global Partnership for Education to champion the call for allocating at least 20 percent of national budgets to education," said President Akufo-Addo.
As the UN Secretary-General notes in his vision statement at the Transforming Education Summit: “Quality education is the single most important investment that any country can make for its future and its people. Investing in education is investing in people and in our collective future. This is a moral, political, and economic imperative. Put simply: the cost of not financing education is much higher than the cost of financing it.”
Ghana has been a GPE partner since 2004 and the country has consistently allocated more than 20 percent of its domestic resources to the education sector over the past years. The president’s new role as GPE champion was announced during the Transforming Education Summit at the United Nations.
GPE currently supports 82 countries and is uniquely positioned to help lower-income countries deliver 12 years of quality education to every child, focusing on the most vulnerable.