ISLAMABAD, Sept 8: Federal Minister for Education Lt-Gen (retired) Javed Ashraf Qazi has said the country will achieve the targets set under the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in the education sector. He was speaking to the participants of a walk jointly organized by the ministry and Unesco on the occasion of International Literacy Day here on Thursday.

Goal two of the MDGs says that countries should ensure that by 2015, children everywhere would be able to complete full course of primary education, i.e. achieve universal primary education.

However, international organizations including Unesco have suspected that Pakistan would not be able to achieve the MDGs in the education sector.

The minister said by the year 2015, the country would enhance its enrolment rate to 100 per cent, as currently six million children are unable to attend schools.

He said Pakistan would also improve its ranking in the education profile of the Human Development Report, as the government was implementing rational policies in the education sector. He claimed that the country would enhance its literacy rate to 80 per cent by the end of 2010.

He said the ministry would start the national educational census in October to collect data which would facilitate the policy and decision makers to focus on those areas which really needed government attention.

He said at present Pakistan lagged behind in literacy and related statistics as they were collected during the 1998 national census.

He said the condition of education in rural Sindh and Balochistan was in a bad shape and the government had declared these areas “most priority provinces”. The two provinces would be included in each educational development scheme at the national level.