Bhaktapur, September 2

Non-Formal Education Centre is preparing to declare 30 more districts as fully literate.

Till date, NFEC has successfully declared 29 districts as fully literate. Though the government had aimed to declare all 75 districts as fully literate by the end of 2015 under the Education For All campaign, it failed to meet the target due to various reasons

Diwakar Dhungel, executive director, NFEC, today said the agenda was to ensure that all citizens were literate by the end of 2015 as per EFA. However, due to civil unrest in some Tarai districts, they could not launch the literacy programmes there, thus failing to meet the target.

“We will work to declare 30 more districts as fully literate to achieve the target of zero-illiteracy in the country,” he added.

NFEC had claimed that 92.5 per cent Nepali citizens between the ages of 15 and 60 years were made literate before the celebration of 49th International Literacy Day last year.

According to the Centre’s record, there were approximately 300,000 illiterate people in the country last year. It had run literacy classes for nearly 146,000 citizens by the end of fiscal year 2015/16 through continuous education programmes.

The NFEC has made a target to further educate 157,000 citizens by the end of this fiscal.

The government has allocated Rs 370 million for NFEC for the current fiscal year.

Nepal government is celebrating the 50th International Literacy Day on September 8 with a slogan ‘Reading the past, Writing the future’.

NFEC will organise a week-long programme to celebrate the day and raise awareness about literacy programmes for the development of an individual as well as the entire nation.

The week-long programme includes a lok dohari competition, screening of short drama related to literacy, exhibitions related to information education, rally and others according to NFEC.

Irina Bokova, director general of United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation has stressed on literacy for a sustainable future for all on the 50th anniversary of International Literacy Day.

“The world has changed since 1866-but our determination to provide every woman and man with the skills, capacities and opportunities to become everything they wish, in dignity and respect, remains as firm as ever,” she said.