May 27 : As the federal government is going to unveil its annual budget for the new fiscal year 2020/21 tomorrow, the education related organizations have suggested the government to consider raising budget to education sector to 20 per cent from the existing 10 per cent.    

Considering the adverse effects of COVID-19 pandemic on the education sector, the National Campaign for Education (NCE) conducted a virtual discussion among the education experts on how much budget education sector should be allocated in this new fiscal year.    

Taking part in the discussion, former Minister for Health and Former Secretary at Ministry of Education Bidhyadhar Mallik opined that the government should consider investment of 5.5 per cent of the country’s GDP in the education sector. He viewed that the budget should be increased for the education sector to obtain the goals of school sector reform programme by 2021.    

Similarly, educationist Dr Binaya Kusiyat argued that it was imperative to raise the budget for education sector. According to him, more classrooms should be built and more teachers ought to be recruited after the COVID-19 crisis is over for which more budget would be needed.
   
The additional budget for the education sector could be garnered from donor agencies or by levying progressive tax or by obtaining loan, he advised.    

Likewise, Joint-Secretary at the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology Krishna Kapri shared that proposal was made to the government to place a high priority to education sector after health in the upcoming budget.    

He informed that Ministry of Finance was going to approve over Rs 10 million for his Ministry to provide educational materials immediately to those education institutions in need.     

source: risingnepaldaily, 27 May 2020

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