缅北禁地

Text as delivered*

Thank you very much, ambassador. I wish to thank OSA and the AU Observer mission for this most timely event. It allows us to engage on some of the important issues that affect our continent's development, growth and prosperity. And I also wish to express my appreciation for the rich inputs we have received from our speakers in the last session. The timeliness of this high level meeting is that it empowers us to engage meaningfully in the ongoing processes at the 缅北禁地that will shape the future of multilateralism, moving from a strong African base enables us to have a keen sense of how to show up and how to advance the interests of this beloved continent of ours. And showing up we are. And coming to the topic at hand, let me state upfront that the AU's annual theme of Educate and Skill Africa for the 21st century is most important.

It has also been carefully crafted to speak to lifelong learning, education at all stages of life and for various needs. Education is what takes nations forward and as Nelson Mandela said, education is the most powerful weapon you can use to change the world. He further said, education is the great engine of personal development. It is through education that the daughter of a peasant can become a doctor, that the son of a mine worker can become the head of the mine, that a child of farmworkers can become the president of a great nation. It is what we make out of what we have, not what we are given, that separates one person from another. My own mother, by the way, told me that education would be my best husband.

So when I respect coming to this theme in the 21st century that we have these challenges and opportunities, despite the many achievements that we have made as African countries so far in this century, there is still so much to do. And we heard earlier from our speakers and while our countries are doing their best, we all face the challenges of conflicts that are raging our planet that is under strain, the impact of climate and biodiversity that we so much depend on as Africa, the health challenges, including Covid. And we all know the impact of Covid 19 on the ability of our countries to continue making progress on agenda 2063 and the SDGs. Many of our resources had to be diverted to protect and save lives and livelihoods. Additional resources had to be sourced, forcing countries to incur debts at great cost. Today, many African countries are highly indebted and unfortunately, addressing sovereign debt has become one of the impediments to development and growth. And as I said, addressing the SDGs, and we have all seen the statistics that indicate the cost of servicing debt, Vis-a-vis budget allocation for health, education and infrastructure and I think that the SG spoke to that earlier today. Regardless, the current challenges should not get in the way of pursuing education with vigor. In fact, we need education to tackle all these challenges and hence Transforming Education Summit in 2022 was so critical and we need to implement its outcomes on digital transformation and its impact on education.

Excellencies, we know that the currency of the 21st century is digital, new and frontier technologies are the order of the day. Luckily, the AU has solid strategies. You've heard about CSR, you've heard about the one on science, technology and innovation and strategy for Africa. But further, we have in place the Digital Education Strategy Implementation Plan for 2023 to 2028. The challenge will be our commitment to implementing these strategies in all earnest and knowing the impediments and how to collectively tackle the impediments. The ongoing negotiations on the Global Digital Compact is part of the pact of the future, and the summit of the future gives us a good opportunity to ensure our needs of Africa, in their interest, are taken into account, and that our challenges are addressed. To date, the Africa Group has done its best encoding its input into the compact process that's underway. But we can do better for sure. And I just want to quickly recognize our own ambassador of Zambia who is the core facilitator for the GDC. As we negotiate the compact, the global digital compact. Let us look closely with an African lens at all the aspects of the compact, whether it's AI governance, rule of data, data governance, digital economies, green technologies, digital skills and capacities. Let's look at all of that with an African lens. And I just want to say it is meaningful participation of women and girls in digital transformation that we make the biggest difference. At a country level we need to look at our own government policies and strategies. Prioritizing Stem education, strong ecosystems for research and development in technology are needed. I always say instead of asking for technology transfer it instead of saying how do we create it ourselves? How do we invest in research and development so that we can come with our own technologies?

And we are doing that, but we can do more of that. Without these above elements the future of education and in a in a continent will be hamstrung. And I really believe that the current work that is being done by ECA on a country's roadmaps is essential. My last comments are on innovative financing for education.

At this juncture, we know of the SDG financing gap, and again, we hear about it and the fiscal constraints, that most of our countries have. It is therefore important that we explore other ways of accessing financing for SDG 4 quality education. There are currently instruments and mechanisms new and established that lend themselves to financing education. And some of those came out of the Transforming Education Summit in 2022 on new facilities and mechanisms. I just have two quick points to make. Firstly, we need to familiarize ourselves with the new tools and instruments like education bonds, debt swaps for education, loan buy downs and private sector impact investing in other global facilities. And one of them, the SG referred to. But understanding these it requires us to have the best skills and capacities in our own countries to negotiate access to such tools and mechanisms and possibilities in a way that we don't get shortchanged.

I've often heard about de-risking, and after we de-risk, we still don't get the benefit of that de-risking. Secondly, we need to look at our own domestic resources and prioritize education. Just understanding the percentage of funds spent in education vis-a-vis other SDGs and the impact and the return on that education and on budget decisions that we make is an essential part of the puzzle and will take us further down the line.

The UNDP specifically has done work that assists Member States to look at the SDGs in an integrated fashion and find ways to accelerate achievement of such while accessing private sector funding. It is for us, Excellencies, dear colleagues, to understand our specific situations, research and understand the possibilities are referred to and pursue opportunities and what's possible wisely. I thank you.

*This text is an AI-generated transcript of the statement, which was obtained from an archived video recording of the event. It is not an official text of the statement.