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| Sub-regional
EFA Forum (SRF) for East and South East Asia |
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7
December 2000; UNESCO-PROAP
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MINUTES
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| Present: |
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1. Mr.
Zhou Nanzhao, UNESCO-PROAP
2. Ms.
Rika Fujioka, FAO
3. Ms.
Keiko Watanabe, JICA
4. Mr.
Abdul Wahid bin Sulaiman, SEAMEO
5. Ms.
Duangtip Surintatip, Permanent Delegation of Thailand to UNESCO
6. Ms.
Duriya Amatavivat, Thailand National Commission for UNESCO
7. Mr.
Jim Irvine, UNICEF-EAPRO
8. Mr.
A.H.A. Hakeem, UNESCO-PROAP (Secretariat)
9. Mr.
Kiichi Oyasu, UNESCO-PROAP
10. Mr.
Nyi Nyi Thaung, UNESCO-PROAP
11. Mr.
Toshiyuki Matsumoto, UNESCO-PROAP
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| Apologies: |
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1. Mr.
Yasushi Hirosato, ADB
2. Ms.
Nanda Krairiksh, ESCAP
3. Ms.
Asa Jonsson, ESCAP
4. Ms.
Sandra Pellegrom, Royal Netherlands Embassy
5.
Mr. Apichai Sunchindah, UNDP
6. Ms.
Parichart Siwaraksa, UNDP
7. Ms.
Dominique Altner, UNESCO-PROAP
8.
Mr. Pornchai Suchitta, UNFPA
9.
Ms. Tanaporn Poshyananda, World Bank
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| Mr. Zhou
Nanzhao, Director a.i. of UNESCO-PROAP, opened the meeting and
explained that he was chairing the meeting as the acting Coordinator
of the Sub-regional EFA Forum (SRF) for East and South East
Asia. He expected that a new Director of PROAP would soon be
appointed and would chair the next SRF working group meeting
to be held in January 2001. |
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| and function
of this meeting without participation of other members outside
Bangkok. It was explained that the SRF is expected to function
on three levels: (i) day-to-day operation; (ii) a working group
that may meet every quarter or more often and consists of UN
agencies, international and regional organizations and bilateral
and multilateral donors; and (iii) a plenary forum that may
meet once or twice a year and consists of all SRF members. In
the working group meeting, all major activities about the follow-up
to the Dakar Framework for Action will be discussed, and the
meeting should have an agreement within the SRF working group
members. Major decisions should be adopted in the SRF plenary
forum. This meeting was a working group meeting and aimed to
discuss the issues in the agenda. What has been discussed and
recommended by the meeting will be circulated to all SRF members
for their amendment or approval. |
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| 1. 1st
Meeting of the Working Group on EFA |
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| The report
of the mission undertaken by Mr. Zhou to the first meeting of
the Global Working Group on EFA at UNESCO Headquarters on 22-24
November 2000 was circulated. The objective of the meeting was
exchange of information about the progress made at national,
regional and international levels, following the Dakar World
Education Forum in April 2000. It was advised that the bi-weekly
Bulletin Board on follow-up activities to the World Education
Forum is published by UNESCO at the following website: |
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| http://www2.unesco.org/wef/en-news/Bulletin%20Board.shtm |
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| Ms. Duangtip
Surintatip, Deputy Permanent Delegate of Thailand to UNESCO,
referred to the existence of many initiatives related to EFA
at the global level, and that some SRF members may not have
sufficient information about these initiatives. She also said
that there was lack of clarity on the question of linking or
integrating the global initiatives of UN agencies and development
banks with national EFA plans. She further said that if the
plan were to be costed as suggested by UNICEF representative
at the Global Working Group on EFA, the EFA plan should be a
separate one although integrated into the national plan. |
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| With regard
to data collection for monitoring progress in EFA some agencies,
along with UIS, are compiling EFA follow-up data in selected
areas at disaggregated levels. In this regard, it was emphasized
that while UIS is expected to play an important role in the
area of EFA data collection other organizations including the
OECD are important partners in this activity. |
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| Mr. Zhou
Nanzhao expressed his disappointment about the lack of emphasis
on the SRF at the meeting. It was reported that Mr. Zhou discussed
with Mr. Jacques Hallak, ADG/ED a.i. of UNESCO, what the SRF
for East and Southeast Asia had been doing, and explained the
importance of the SRF in regard to the follow-up activities
to the Dakar Framework for Action, at least for East and Southeast
Asia. |
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| 2. National
EFA Coordinators Meeting |
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| Mr. Jim
Irvine, UNICEF-EAPRO, briefly reviewed the report on the National
EFA Coordinators Meeting, held on 2-3 November 2000 in Bangkok.
It was stressed that the meeting was able to provide the National
EFA Coordinators with a good opportunity to share the information
about what each country in the sub-region has done since the
World Education Forum in late April 2000. |
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| Mr. Irvine
also stressed that there is a need to mobilize fund for the
SRF Secretariat in order to function at full strength. He suggested
that one possibility is to approach country level EFA partners
to share the cost as well as to utilize their resources, which
he found had worked successfully in some countries. Mr. Abdul
Wahid bin Sulaiman, SEAMEO, supported the idea and informed
the meeting that SEAMEO has 15 training centres in this sub-region
and some resources to support training programmes. |
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| Following
the agenda item 1 and 2, the importance of resource mobilization
was discussed. It was reported that Mr. Charles Currin, Lead
Education Specialist of ADB, will come to Bangkok in January
2000. In this connection, it was suggested that the next meeting
should discuss how the SRF could prepare some project proposals
on EFA follow-up activities to submit to donor agencies and
development banks. |
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| Mr. Irvine
also suggested that there are several countries with resources,
such as Australia, Japan, New Zealand, Republic of Korea and
Singapore in the Asia Pacific region, and the SRF should seek
how the SRF could enhance the limited resources of some countries
by assistance from other more affluent countries. Ms. Keiko
Watanabe explained that JICA is a bilateral agency. In principle,
there is no scheme to undertake any sub-regional or regional
project per se. However, JICA can learn the EFA activities in
the SFR member countries and inform these initiatives to the
respective JICA field offices and Headquarters in Tokyo for
further bi-lateral collaboration. In addition, she introduced
the JICA's scheme of "Third country training programme" which
enhances the South-South cooperation utilizing the core country's
resources. |
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| 3. Terms
of reference of the SRF |
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| The meeting
discussed the TOR of the SRF. Mr. Abdul Wahid bin Sulaiman stressed
the importance of the longer-term support to the National EFA
Forum. In this connection, he commented that the use of the
word "operation" in item one is appropriate. It was suggested
that the TOR should be general and the phrase "in co-operation
with UNESCO Institute of Statistics" in item five be deleted
because not only UNESCO but also some other agencies are collecting
data. It was also suggested that it will be difficult for the
SRF for East and Southeast Asia to provide the other three SRFs
with technical support given the limited funds and manpower
available. |
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On the
basis of these suggestions, the TOR were revised to read as
follows:
1.
Providing support for the establishment and operation of
the National EFA Forum;
2. Supporting
country level reviews, up-dating or formulating of EFA national
plans through harmonized technical cooperation;
3. Capacity
building for implementation and monitoring of EFA plans;
4. Sharing
information among members of the forum, and harmonizing
programming and formulation of projects;
5. Monitoring
of, and technical assistance to, the member countries' data
collection and analysis;
6.
Helping identify and mobilize resources for common priority
initiatives; and
7. Providing
secretarial support and clearing-house information services
for the other three SRFs namely: Central Asia and the Trans-Caucasus;
Pacific; and, South and West Asia, as needed.
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| The meeting
proposed that the chairperson should write to the Coordinators
of the three other SRFs in the region to clarify whether Member
States in these sub-regions need secretarial support and clearing-house
function from the SRF for East and Southeast Asia. |
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| Membership
of the SRF |
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| The meeting
reviewed the membership of the SRF in the report on the National
EFA Coordinators Meeting. It was pointed out that APEC has strong
interest in the education activities, but ASEAN is not so active
in the field of education, especially in basic education. It
was reported that the Chinese National Commission for UNESCO
expressed its interest in being a member of the SRF. It was
stressed that the membership of the SRF should be kept open.
In this regard, it was suggested that the SRF should again ask
bilateral agencies working in the field of education in East
and Southeast Asia whether they are interested in being members
of the SRF. Mongolia and Papua New Guinea attended the National
EFA Coordinators Meeting in November 2000. The SRF will ask
their Ministry of Education to clarify their interest in being
a member of the SRF for East and Southeast Asia. Although Singapore
officially expressed lack of interest in being a member of the
SRF for East and Southeast Asia, the Secretariat will approach
Singapore again at an appropriate moment. Also the Secretariat
will contact Brunei which had not replied to the earlier invitation
to join the SRF. |
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| 4. Work
modality and Secretariat of the SRF |
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| The meeting
reviewed the work modality of the SRF in the report on the National
EFA Coordinators Meeting. It was suggested that it is not appropriate
to use the word "strong support" in the item eight. Based on
this suggestion, item eight was revised to read as follows: |
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| The SRF
Secretariat will serve as the clearing-house to provide regular
correspondence and information concerning EFA activities in
this sub-region. |
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| Mr. Zhou
Nanzhao informed the meeting that UNESCO PROAP would continue
to serve as the SRF Secretariat and Mr. A.H.A. Hakeem, Coordinator
of APPEAL was appointed to be SRF Secretary who will work in
close collaboration with Ms. Dominique Altner, Chief of PSA
and that the SRF Secretariat will now be located in the APPEAL
Unit. APPEAL (Asia-Pacific Programme of Education for All) was
created as regional cooperative programme on Education for All.
Mr. Kiichi Oyasu, Programme Specialist of APPEAL, will be a
new member of the SRF Secretariat. Mr. Nyi Nyi Thaung and Mr.
Toshiyuki Matsumoto will continue to work as a member of the
SRF Secretariat. E-mail address of the SRF Secretariat remains
the same ( SRF@unesco-proap.org ). |
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| 5. Project
initiative |
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| Mr. Zhou
Nanzhao explained that PROAP professionals prepared and submitted
12 proposals on urgent actions for Dakar follow-up, as requested
by UNESCO Director-General, in cooperation with other UNESCO
field offices in the region. He also mentioned about the current
and potential funding support from Japan to APPEAL. |
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| Mr. Jim
Irvine suggested that all agencies who have education programs/projects
in the region be invited to report on them to the Secretariat
at the next working group meeting to share the information such
as plans and priorities, look for possibilities for joint projects
and avoid duplication and inefficient resource utilization.
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| Mr. A.H.A.
Hakeem, UNESCO-PROAP, pointed out that the issue on life skills
was raised as a possible topic for early action at the National
EFA Coordinators Meeting in November 2000. |
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| The importance
of using ICT as a tool to promote EFA was stressed. It was suggested
that information on ICT and its relations to education can be
accessed through the following UNESCO websites: |
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| http://www.unesco.org/education/e_learning/index.html |
| http://www.unescobkk.org/infores/pips/info1/cover.htm |
| http://www.unescobkk.org/infores/pips/edtech.htm |
| http://www.unescobkk.org/infores/pips/inf.htm |
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| 6. Integration/cooperation
with the UN Inter-agency Thematic Working Group (TWG) on EFA |
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| Mr. Zhou
Nanzhao explained both the common objectives of SRF and TWG
in EFA and the difference between them. A major difference is
that SRF is a sub-regional mechanism for EFA in East and Southeast
Asia and includes the members outside UN agencies such as ADB,
SEAMEO, bilateral donors, NGOs and Member States, while TWG
focuses on region-wide activity and its membership is UN agencies.
It was suggested that this issue be decided upon at the next
working group meeting. Since ESCAP and UNDP have been chairing
meetings of Heads of UN agencies (HOA) and are main coordinators
of UN TWG, it was important that they be fully consulted and
present at discussions on this matter. The Secretariat will
distribute the background information of TWG to the SRF working
group members. |
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| 7. Next
SRF meeting |
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| The
meeting decided to hold the next working group meeting tentatively
on 17 January 2001. The date of the next meeting will be re-considered
after consultation with the members who did not attend this
meeting and Messrs. Charles Currin and Yasushi Hirosato, who
will be invited to the next meeting to represent ADB. |
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