Pakistan spends 7 times more on arms than on schools

Society Pakistan & World Affairs
1

Just think… if we can spend that money on schools and invest in our people we could be major economics power instead of basket case that we are today.

http://www.dawn.com/2011/03/02/pakistan-spends-7-times-more-on-arms-than-on-schools.html

Pakistan spends 7 times more on arms than on schools

By Amin Ahmed ](http://www.dawn.com/author/newspaper/)

http://www.dawn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/weapons-543.jpg

“Just one-fifth of Pakistan`s military spending would be sufficient to finance the universal primary education.” - File Photo

**ISLAMABAD: Pakistan, with one of the worlds largest out-of-school population, about 7.3 million, spends over seven times as much on arms as on primary schools, says a report of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco). ** The discrepancy between primary education and military expenditure is so large that just one-fifth of Pakistans military spending would be sufficient to finance the universal primary education, asserts the Education for All (EFA) Global Monitoring Report 2011 published on Tuesday.
It said that diversion of national resources to the military and loss of government revenue meant that armed conflict shifted the responsibility for education financing from government to households. The report called on national governments and donors to urgently review the potential for converting unproductive spending on weapons into productive investment in schools.
The 1999-2008 period which was marked by high economic growth, real growth in education spending was higher than the rates of economic growth. The total public expenditure on education as percentage of GNP was 2.9 per cent in 2008, compared to 2.6 per cent in 1999.
The report says that the impact of armed conflict on education has been widely neglected. This hidden crisis is reinforcing poverty, undermining economic growth and holding back the progress of nations. In Pakistan, some 600,000 children in three districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were reported in 2009 to have missed one year or more of school because of conflict and displacement.
Insurgent groups in KPK and Fata have attacked girls primary and secondary schools. The report says that motives for attacking education infrastructure vary. Schools may be seen as embodying state authority and, therefore, a legitimate target, especially when insurgent groups oppose, as in Afghanistan, the type of education promoted by governments. The use of schools by armed forces can lead to their being targeted by anti-state groups and abandoned by communities. In recent years, the countrys madressahs have been viewed as a recruiting ground for potential terrorists. However, there is little credible evidence to support this conclusion, the report says.
Most parents send their children to the madressah to receive the Quran education, or to escape a failing state system. The real challenge for Pakistan is to strengthen the failing state education and to build bridges between that system and madressah schools.
“Yet the generalised international climate of hostility towards madressahs, fuelled by donors, is not conducive to bridge-building,” the report says.
In Pakistan, the post-independence government adopted Urdu as the national language and the language of instructions in schools. This became a source of alienation in a country which is home to six major linguistic groups and 58 smaller ones.
The report says that Pakistan has one of the world`s largest youth bulges, with 37 per cent of the population under 15. Unemployed educated youths figure prominently in some armed conflict in Pakistan.
The report said that 49 per cent of the poorest children aged 7 to 16 were out of school in 2007, compared with 5 per cent of children from the wealthiest households. Location and gender reinforce the disparities – poor rural girls were 21 times less likely to be in school than wealthy urban boys.
The number of children out of school in the country may fall by one-fifth to 5.8 million by 2015.

2

Re: Pakistan spends 7 times more on arms than on schools

What are comparative numbers for 'neighbors'?

3

Re: Pakistan spends 7 times more on arms than on schools

^^ Quick googling says $36 billion on defence and $11.5 billion on education by the 'neighbor'

4

Re: Pakistan spends 7 times more on arms than on schools

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110301/ap_on_re_us/un_un_education_and_conflict_3

UN: 67 million kids not in school

By EDITH M. LEDERER, Associated Press Edith M. Lederer, Associated Press – Tue Mar 1, 10:53 am ET
UNITED NATIONS – With the 2015 U.N. target for ensuring universal primary education fast approaching, the U.N. education agency warned Tuesday that 67 million children are not attending school, including 28 million caught in armed conflicts.
UNESCO’s 2011 Global Monitoring Report concluded that the world is not on track to achieve the goal set by world leaders at a U.N. summit in 2000 “by a wide margin,” despite progress in many areas.
From 1999 to 2008, UNESCO said an additional 52 million children enrolled in primary school — but it said the number of children out school is falling too slowly, to 67 million in 2008.
“If current trends continue,” the report warned, “there could be more children out of school in 2015 than there are today.”
It singled out “the hidden crisis” of youngsters caught in armed conflict as one key reason.
Of the total number of primary school age children who are not enrolled in school, 42 percent — around 28 million — live in poor countries affected by conflict, the report said.
“Children and schools today are on the front line of armed conflicts, with classrooms, teachers and pupils seen as legitimate targets,” the UNESCO report said.
In Afghanistan, at least 613 attacks on schools were recorded in 2009, up from 347 in 2008, the report said. Insurgents in Pakistan have made numerous attacks on girls schools including one in which 95 girls were injured, it said.
In North Yemen, 220 schools were destroyed, damaged or looted during fighting in 2009 and 2010, the report said. And in Gaza, Israeli attacks in 2008 and 2009 left 350 children dead, 1,815 injured and 280 schools damaged, it said.
Children are also being used as soldiers in 24 countries including Congo, Chad, the Central African Republic, Myanmar and Sudan, the report said.
UNESCO cited evidence in reports from U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon that rape and sexual violence are widely used as a weapon of war in many countries including Afghanistan, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo and Sudan.
“Many victims are young girls,” the report said, citing Congo where one-third of rapes involve children and 13 percent are against children under the age of 10.
UNESCO warned that armed conflict is also diverting public funds from education into military spending.
The report identified 21 of the world’s poorest developing countries that spend more on the military than on education.
“With some of the world’s worst education indicators, Chad spends four times as much on arms as on primary schools, and Pakistan spends seven times as much,” the report said.
If countries devoting more to military budgets than to primary education were to cut military spending by just 10 percent, “they could put a total of 9.5 million additional children in school — equivalent to a 40 percent reduction in their combined out-of-school population,” it said.
According to UNESCO, overall aid to basic education has doubled since 2002 to US$4.7 billion, but falls far short of the $16 billion required to help low-income countries.
The report calls for tougher action against human rights violations to ensure all youngsters get a primary school education, an overhaul of global aid priorities, and greater attention to the ways education failures can increase the risk of conflict.

5

Re: Pakistan spends 7 times more on arms than on schools

I wonder if the Pak figure was arrived strictly on the basis of the defense budget vs. education budget or was it is adjusted for real time expenses? WOT also has increased spending (and graft) not that I am not in favor of a leaner modern face, while we focus on education and R&D since nukes protect us from extermination.