Launch of the Education Plus Initiative Ms. Seraphine Wakana UN Resident Coordinator, the Gambia

Excellencies, Distinguished participants, Ladies and Gentlemen, all protocol observed.

It is with great pleasure that I welcome you to this country launch of the Education Plus

Initiative.

I would like to begin my remarks by reflecting on the colliding pandemics that continue to disproportionately impact us here in the Gambia. The COVID19 pandemic and the HIV pandemic. These two pandemics are inextricably linked with devastating impacts at individual, household, community, and national levels. They are reversing the progress made on achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and now more than ever, we must act to address these challenges.

As we speak right now, a high-level political forum (HLPF) is underway in New York, to review the progress countries have made on the Sustainable Development Goals which aimed to end poverty, protect the earth's environment and climate, and ensure that people everywhere can enjoy peace and prosperity. In the progress update that the Gambia will provide, as part of the voluntary national review (VNR), a specific challenge that will be highlighted is the impact of COVID19 on education through school closures and the economic disruption still being felt.

As many of you witnessed, the restrictions imposed to curb the spread of COVID19 led to school closures, job losses and disruptions to access to health and social services. Adolescent girls have borne and continue to bear the brunt of the impact. Without the protection offered by schools, a rise in teenage pregnancies, child marriage and poverty brought on by economic hardships resulted in many girls dropping out of school, getting married and fuelled the increase in HIV infections. More than half (55%) of the estimated 27,000 people living with HIV are females aged 15 years and above.  75% of adolescent girls and young women and 68% of adolescent boys and young men aged 15–24 years do not have knowledge of HIV prevention[i].

Yet we know what works - Education. Both in school and out of school, education plays a key role in addressing intersecting inequalities, reducing HIV transmission, and HIV-related stigma and discrimination. In the Gambia, only 48% of adolescent girls who enrol in lower secondary education complete school while only 28% complete upper secondary education[ii]. This is alarming, as data shows us that education, especially girls’ completion of secondary education, is a powerful strategy for HIV prevention.

The Sustainable Development Goals are premised on leaving no-one behind. But adolescent girls and young women are still being left behind due to gender inequalities and harmful social norms including harmful practices such as child, early and forced marriage, gender-based and sexual violence, early pregnancy, and lack of access to gender-responsive, youth-friendly sexual and reproductive health services, often with grave consequences. Unequal gender power dynamics and gender-based violence continue to put adolescent girls and young women at high risk of acquiring HIV and dying from AIDS-related illnesses.

The Gambia committed to both achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, and to ending AIDS by 2030. In supporting the government to achieve these goals in national development priorities, the UN Country Team that I lead, committed to support the government through three key outcome areas in the UN Development Assistance Framework (UNDAF).

The Education Plus is a flagship initiative that seeks to provide human capital development support. It is co-led by UNAIDS, UNESCO, UNFPA, UNICEF and UN Women and aims to use education systems as an entry point to provide a holistic “plus” package of essential elements those adolescent girls and young women need as they become adults. These include comprehensive sexuality education, sexual and reproductive health and rights, including HIV prevention, freedom from sexual and gender-based violence and economic security and empowerment through school-to-work transitions.  

The Education Plus Initiative rallies political leadership, development partners and communities to fulfil every adolescent girl’s right to education and health by enabling all girls to complete a quality, secondary education in violence-free environments. It advocates for gender-responsive reforms in policies, laws and practices to guarantee the education, health and other social and economic rights of adolescent girls and young people. This evidence confirms that girls—and their communities and countries—reap multiple social and economic benefits from their completion of secondary school.

This is why I am excited about the groundbreaking Education Plus Initiative, an accelerator for the achievement of Gambia’s national development priorities. As the UN, we look forward to working with all of you in implementing Education Plus, to end the intersecting inequalities that leave many adolescents and young people behind, to end AIDS and to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. 

Thank you for your attention.