SADC Education Ministers Meet in Maputo Over Sector Reform

Southern African Development Community

Education ministers from SADC (Southern African Development Community), meeting in Maputo on Thursday, have stressed that technical and professional education forms the fundamental basis for ensuring that young people can gain access to employment and to know-how.

Opening the meeting, the Mozambican Education Minister, Augusto Jone, said that education must effectively support regional integration within SADC, by providing the region with technical staff who are well trained and equipped with the necessary knowledge.

Speaking to reporters after the formal opening session, Jone said that, with the basic elements of knowledge and know-how, “we will defeat poverty, and we will build a region with sustainable development for all our fellow citizens”.

Jone admitted that Mozambique has a smaller percentage of its population in university education than several other SADC members. He attributed this to the relatively small number of institutions of higher education in the country, and the poor quality of some of them.

The African Union Commissioner for Human Resources, Science and Technology, Martial Ikounga, told the meeting that strengthening technical and professional education was a pressing need for the continent.

But he admitted that many children were still not attending school. “This year we have formulated education and training strategies to develop Africa, but, even with education free of charge in some African countries, children and young people are not flowing into the schools”, he said. Governments should therefore take further measures to encourage children and adolescents to attend school.

Chikumbutso Hiwa, the deputy minister of education, science and technology of Malawi (the country that currently chairs SADC), said that an adequate pupil-teacher ratio in SADC is far from being reached.

Furthermore, the education systems were not providing the technical training that young people need.

Hiwa warned that a further million teachers must be recruited in SADC by 2015, in order to reach an acceptable pupil/teacher ratio.