From its creation UNESCO has been involved in partnerships with countries to help them build up their capacities to meet the challenges of educational development. Elaboration of educational policies and their implementation was an area where the Organization acquired a vast experience. This "upstream" phase involves formulating country sector policies and strategies, drawing up action plans, programmes and projects prior to the actual launching of these programme or projects under what is now commonly referred to as the "downstream" phase.
An increasing number of countries have requested UNESCO to help
them devise their education policies, programmes, and action plans for a systemic
development of their education systems. The rise in these requests has contributed to this
area becoming an activity in its own right.
The requests for assistance are forwarded principally by ministries in charge of education
and training that are working under increasing resource constraints. The local educational
contexts in certain countries are becoming increasingly fragile. Very often, these
countries are threatened by political instability, civil disorders and financial crisis.
Though most countries now boast better qualified national professional staff than twenty
years ago, lack of exposure to appropriate skills required for the new challenges of the
management techniques, staff mobility and finacial constraints has created an environment
which is not always favourable for sustainable policy formulation and educational
development. The growing socio-economic constrants confronting most developing countries
have shown the difficulties faced by their social sectors, namely education and health.
Hence the need to integrate these sector policies within an overall macro socio-economic
policy framework in order to preserve them from the overall financial austerity measures.
UNESCO has developed innovative upstream activities which try to respond to the broad
spectrum of countries undergoing different situations. UNESCO has paid special attention
to Least Developed Countries (LDCs) in Africa and South East Asia and countries going
rapid political and economic transition or post-conflict reconstruction. In recent years,
upstream activities have been broadened to encompass several complementary cross-country
initiatives such as the regional Working Group on Education Sector Analysis (WGESA) in the
framework of the Association for the Development of Education in Africa (ADEA) and
inter-agency partnerships on education reform and international cooperation.
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