NEW YORK (UNITED STATES) (ITALPRESS) – Italy doubles from 25 to 50 million euros its contribution to the Global Partnership for Education (GPE) for the period 2026-2030, concentrating interventions mainly on Africa and the education of girls. The announcement came from the vice-premier and foreign minister Antonio Tajani at the high-level event “Multiply Possibility: In New Era for Education Financing”, co-chaired by Italy and Nigeria on the margin of the 81st United Nations General Assembly. “Education is still the most powerful investment we can make for development,” said Tajani, recalling the initial video message of President Giorgia Meloni. “More education means less conflicts and wars. More education means more peace, growth and cooperation.” Tajani defined education as a priority of Italian foreign policy and a pillar of the Mattei Plan, indicating as an objective “partnership tra pari” with Africa. The minister also recalled the more than 270 university students from Gaza welcomed by Italy, with the objective, he explained, to help form “the future Palestinian leadership”.
To collect the Italian announcement was Malala Yousafzai. The Nobel Peace Prize has recalled that 132 million girls are out of school and has asked governments not only funding, but policies that really guarantee gender equality in education. “I have lived too many times in rooms where leaders agreed on everything and did not commit themselves to anything,” said Malala. This time he indicated just Rome as an example: “I hope many of you will match the courageous commitment of Italy.” Health, peace, equality and opportunity, he added, “combine in a school classroom”. In a video message, Jannik Sinner told his experience as a boy raised in a small town in Northern Italy with teachers, family and chances to pursue his dreams. “More than 270 million children still have no access to a classroom, a teacher or a safe school,” he recalled.
Not because they lack “talent or determination”, but because they have not received the opportunities they deserve. The number one of world tennis explained that this is the basis of the Jannik Sinner Foundation and the partnership with GPE: “Today we have the power to multiply opportunities for 750 million children.” To close the event for Italy was the Minister of Education and Merit Giuseppe Valditara, who focused his intervention on the global crisis of learning and especially on the shortage of teachers. By 2030, he explained, it will need 34 million more in the world, 15 million in sub-Saharan Africa alone. “We must listen to the young. I am our present and our future,” said Valditara, relaunching the Italian proposal to directly involve students in international education initiatives. Italy, he added, is already working through the Mattei Plan to strengthen educational systems and skills of teachers in different African countries. “No country, no child must be left behind,” he concluded.
– photo IPA Agency –
(ITALPRESS).
