ISLAMABAD, March 6: President Gen Pervez Musharraf said here on Tuesday the government had decided to spend 4 per cent of GDP for improving literacy rate in the country.

He said that the government had decided to expand tax base in the country to meet the expenditure. Inaugurating the upgraded National Defence University (NDU) and the international conference on UN peacekeeping operations, he said the country’s primary and secondary education needed improvement but it required huge resources.

The president said that more resources were also being made available for promoting higher education without which no country could develop its human resource programme.

He said the government would spend Rs250 billion to set up nine new universities with the help of France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Japan, South Korea and Turkey, adding that the government would implement its decision to produce 1,500 PhDs every year.

Gen Musharraf, who would be first vice-chancellor of NDU, said that he had no doubt in his mind that economic growth was directly linked with imparting quality education.