Seminar on “Literacy for Peace”
 

NCHD organized a seminar organized on 15th September 2011 in Islamabad with the collaboration of UNESCO to commemorate the International Literacy Day. Minister of Professional and Technical Training (P&TT) Mian Riaz Hussain Pirzada, who was the chief guest atthe occasion, said that the feeder schools and literacy centers of the NCHD can play vital role in providing education to the ignorant masses of the country.

The event was attended by teachers, policy makers, various government officials, and members of civil society.

Talking at the occasion, the minister said that there are about 55 million illiterate people in the country. Around 7 million children of primary school age are out of schools and about 30 million children never enrolled in the schools. Pakistan stands at the second place in the list of countries having maximum number of children out of school.

Mr. Pirzada said, “Despite the fact that female education is an important investment in any country, more than half of the female population in the country never went to school.”

He said that illiterate people are mostly living in poverty and are unable to educate their children as they prefer them earn money.

The minister assured that he will take every step to make NCHD stirring and will bring improvement in its work as such institutions are vital for the prosperity of the country.

The Director General NCHD Mr. Zulfiqar Ahmad said that Pakistan has committed to achieve Education for All (EFA) and Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and boost our literacy rate up to 86% by 2015. But Pakistan’s literacy rate is increasing at 1.08 percent annually which is low against the required increase of 3.2 percent.

DG NCHD said, “If NCHD keeps on working according to its current plan till 2015 it can raise the literacy rate by 10 percent.”

He said that it is unfortunate that the future of around 30,000 thousand employees of NCHD and National Education Foundation (NEF) is still hanging. NCHD employees are working without salaries since last three months. They are trained workforce and will be wasted if government does not find any solution to the current situation.

The other speakers include representative from UNESCO Dr. Kuzue Key Nagata, Chairperson Bunyad Foundation Shaheen Atiqur Rehman, and Chairman PACADE Mr. Inayatullah.