PESHAWAR, Sept 7: NWFP Chief Minister Akram Khan Durrani has said that attaining a higher literacy rate is essential for economic growth, poverty eradication, social participation and environmental protection.

In his message on the World Literacy Day, which is falling on Friday, he said: “It reminds us that literacy is the platform for developing a society’s human resources.”

Mr Durrani said his government had been making efforts to develop the education sector since the day it came into being and had introduced several reforms to the sector.

He said several schools had been upgraded and new colleges and universities had been approved to achieve the millennium goal of cent per cent literacy rate.

He said that measures taken by his government had helped a lot to achieve 5 per cent increase in the literacy rate.

The chief minister said that two million people would be imparted basic education under the ‘Education for All Programme’.

He observed that illiteracy and poverty were main obstacles in the development of the province.

He said that the registration in public sector schools had increased up to 81 per cent as against 62 per cent before his government.—PPI