World Bank approves loan for education

JAKARTA (JP): The World Bank approved on Tuesday a US$104 million to Indonesia to finance the Central Indonesia Junior Secondary Education Project.

The project will expand access to and improve the quality of junior secondary education with the goal of building a well- educated, skilled work force able to meet the needs of Indonesia's growing economy, according to the bank's press statement made available to The Jakarta Post yesterday.

It also praised Indonesia for its commitment to education. "This project, which targets the provinces, is one of a series demonstrating the government's strong commitment to investing in education," the World Bank said.

Indonesia has invested between 12 and 18 percent of its total budget in education over the past years, 72 percent of which targets primary and secondary education. As a result, Indonesia has achieved "one of the best rates of education expansion in the world, virtually attaining universal access to primary education," the World Bank said.

Indonesia in 1994 introduced nine years of basic compulsory education to encourage all school-age children to go to school. The program was an extension of the previous, successful six-year compulsory education scheme.

The Central Indonesia Junior Secondary Education Project will assist the government in its efforts to expand access to junior secondary education by removing obstacles such as costs, availability and location.

It also hopes to improve the quality of education by providing teacher education and training, additional teaching materials and further developing an examination and assessment system.

The project will also help the government in strengthening education management and promote efficiency in each of Indonesia's 27 provinces by providing training in planning, monitoring and evaluation.

Last year, the World Bank also approved a loan of US$132.5 million to make school textbooks available to poor children in Indonesia. The assistance was almost one-third of a US$355 million project designed to increase access to textbooks and encourage reading.

The project, to be implemented over six years, is to make sure that more than 240 million primary and junior secondary textbooks reach more than 36 million students.

The number of junior secondary school students is expected to double from six million today to 13 million by the year 2009. (swe)