Emendata

In 2016, according to the Minister of Education U Myo Thein Gyi in Myanmar, more than 3.5 million people over the age of 15 in Myanmar were illiterate.

The consequences of illiteracy are multiple and harmful in several aspects.

As well as affecting illiterate individuals, they are themselves affecting their daily lives and often jeopardizing their future.

This scourge has a significant effect on society, both socially and economically.

It is an imperative issue to deal with because these illiterate children will one day become adults and the consequences of illiteracy on individuals and society include the following: limited ability to obtain and understand essential information, lower income, higher unemployment, lower-quality jobs, precarious financial position, low self esteem, which can lead to isolation.

Since the Republic of Austria is willing to avoid such consequences for Southeast Asia's children and wants to give them a brighter future, the international community must work with Austria in order to find solutions to solve this issue.

In the past, the General Assembly already voted the resolution A/RES/41/118 about efforts and measures to promote the eradication of illiteracy, but the Republic of Austria believes it is an emergency to focus on the children of Southeast Asia, where the situation could be improved easily.

The Republic of Austria believes in many ideas to eradicate this scourge of illiteracy.

First of all, financing a global program to build schools and allow children to access school in Southeast Asia, should be a top priority.

Indeed, one of the principal causes of illiteracy is the poor access to school in some remoted areas.

In the past few years, youth literacy rates increased from above 80% to almost 100% in South-East Asia but remained significantly low in some rural areas.

To solve this problem, Austria thinks of exempting companies willing to build schools in isolated areas from taxes.

Then, the Republic of Austria supports the idea of creating a school program directly inspired of the best pedagogical program through the world (Singapore, Taiwan, Canada…).

In fact, some of the countries quoted previously, are in the same time efficient in education and situated in Southeast Asia, so it might be time to organize a cooperation between high-performing countries and their less performant neighbours in their educational system.

Such a solution would offer not only the opportunity to lower the illiteracy rate, but would also allow children to get better skills and a true access to higher education.

Lastly, it’s known that inequalities in the access to education, exist not only between rural and urban areas but also between genders and socio-economic conditions that result in to disparities in the delivery of quality learning and opportunities, especially if we talk about access to ICT.

So, to cut illiteracy the Republic of Austria urges to elaborate a new and global program to provide a decent internet access to every child in Southeast Asia.

The UN could cooperate with companies to incite them to supply the more remoted regions, particularly in areas of Indonesia and The Philippines who obviously suffer much more from illiteracy than Singapore or Vietnam.

The Republic of Austria is honored to get the opportunity to deal with such important issues in front of the international community and is truly willing to find solutions to eradicate youth illiteracy in Southeast Asia.