Press and Blog

Governments and world leaders have not taken sufficient action to increase investments in education. Without greater efforts to deliver quality education, the world faces the risk of not meeting the ambitions of the Sustainable Development Goals and failing to close the gap between developed and developing nations.

The International Commission on Financing Global Education Opportunity is a major new global initiative engaging world leaders, policy makers and researchers to develop an investment case and financing pathway for achieving equal educational opportunity for children and young people.

The Commission has three objectives:

• Bring together the best evidence from around the globe about what works to expand and improve learning opportunities.
• Agree on an investment case and agenda for action.
• Inspire and persuade leaders – at all levels and sectors – to action!

The Commission has established a set of research hubs and network of expert advisors focusing on various pieces of investigation. EPG is delighted to be contributing research to this initiative, and we would like to share this with you. We are working in partnership with FICCI-SEDF and Tshwane University to help towards achieving improved education.

The EPG report analyses how government and business can work together to create a sustainable framework for skills levies and an impactful structure for sector-wide skills pledges. It reviews skills levies by governments and pledges by businesses around the world, with a particular focus on the UK, India and South Africa as case studies.

The UK is about to reintroduce a significant and comprehensive Apprenticeship Levy in 2017 after a number of previous stop-start attempts. India aspires to skill 500m Indians by 2022 and is using corporate CSR funds as a key driver for meeting this target. Although similar initiatives have been in place in South Africa for much longer, recent policy changes proposed by the Indian and South African governments to increase their effectiveness have some close parallels. Around 60 countries in the world have introduced skills levies in some form, with mixed results.

The Education Commission will launch its call to action on skills in September 2016. To find out more about their research partners, click here: http://educationcommission.org/about/research-agenda-partners/