[{"bbox": [97, 153, 1135, 287], "category": "Text", "text": "The EU remains a key partner of Cambodia in the education sector, thanks to two decades of partnership in support of the sector policy. The partnership has been evaluated as successful by the independent evaluation of the Budget Support Programme 2018-2022 finalized in early 2023. By linking the new education action as an enabler for the green and digital transformation supported by TEI1 and TEI2, the EU has therefore the opportunity to profile even more its long-term partnership with Cambodia on the priorities of the Global Gateway."}, {"bbox": [97, 318, 1135, 638], "category": "Text", "text": "The action is aligned to the European values of leaving no-one behind and a green and digital development. It contributes directly to education and research under the Global Gateway. By tackling technical education and STEM for green and digital jobs, it supports the digital and climate and energy pillars of the GG, while promoting Cambodia's integration in ASEAN. It directly supports the following specific priorities of ASEAN in education: advance future-ready education at basic and higher education levels, technical and vocational education and training; ensuring inclusive education; building the capacity of education personnel; and mobilising resources for education through partnerships with various key stakeholders⁹. Through the focus on the systemic nodes of data, budgeting and spending, it also promotes the EU values of transparency and accountability. The action is in line with the Joint European Strategy 2021-2027, notably priority area (3): Support quality, accessible and inclusive services to strengthen human capital that contributes to sustainable socioeconomic development and poverty alleviation\", being an enabler for (4): Enhance competitiveness of Cambodia on the regional and global marketplaces, and (5) Sustainable green development."}, {"bbox": [97, 669, 1135, 803], "category": "Text", "text": "The action confirms and reinforces the existing ongoing policy dialogue with the Government, shaping the education priorities to the green and digital transformation of the economy. It provides European expertise to strengthen the green and digital aspects of technical education as well as it supports, in synergy with the ongoing Public Finance Management Reform (PFMR), efficiency, transparency and accountability in management of public funds to improve public service delivery."}, {"bbox": [85, 823, 341, 853], "category": "Section-header", "text": "## 2.2 Problem Analysis"}, {"bbox": [97, 868, 1135, 1108], "category": "Text", "text": "To respond to the medium and long term needs of a green and digitalised economy, Cambodia needs to increase the number of its youth and adults who have the relevant competences and skills. Currently, less than 70% of Cambodian youth attend lower secondary, less than 40% upper secondary and only 12% progress to University, of which only 1/3 to study STEM subjects¹⁰. In terms of quality, less than 10% of 15 year-old students achieve the minimum level of proficiency in reading or in mathematics¹¹. As a result, Cambodia does not have enough middle-level¹² and qualified¹³ technicians, let alone master's and PhD's, to enable the transformation of its economy in the agriculture and the industrial value chains selected by the TEIs. In order to increase the number of people with the relevant skills and competences, not only access and quality of education shall be improved, but also the overall cost-efficiency and governance of the education sector shall increase."}, {"bbox": [97, 1134, 1120, 1162], "category": "Text", "text": "To support Cambodia in this direction, the action addresses a number of key challenges of the sector, including:"}, {"bbox": [97, 1189, 637, 1216], "category": "Section-header", "text": "* **Unequal (including gender-biased) access to education**"}, {"bbox": [97, 1217, 1135, 1349], "category": "Text", "text": "Despite improvement, access to quality education is unequal in Cambodia, including based on gender. In recent years, Boys' attendance rate is lower than girls in primary, lower secondary and upper secondary¹⁴. Data confirm important disparities in terms of net attendance, completion and out-of-school rate based on sex, wealth quintile, location (urban vs rural), ethnicity (Khmer vs non-Khmer) and disability status. COVID has deeply impacted the picture, by putting an additional strain on both the learning outcomes of the students –who have missed several"}, {"bbox": [85, 1381, 1145, 1502], "category": "Footnote", "text": "⁹ Highlights of ASEAN's work in education include: 1) Supports for students and learners transition to the workforce through internship opportunities, higher education scholarships and responsive skills development; 2) Supports for teachers and vocational trainers on the latest teaching methods and strategies; 3) Advocacy to reach out-of-school children and youth; 4) Advocacy for safe and resilient schools. All these issues will be targeted by the action, either via the variable tranche targets or the complementary measures of the programme."}, {"bbox": [85, 1501, 1012, 1527], "category": "Footnote", "text": "¹⁰ Education Congress Report, April 2022; Mid Term Review of the Education Sector Policy (ESP) 2021/2022."}, {"bbox": [85, 1526, 426, 1550], "category": "Footnote", "text": "¹¹ PISA-D (2018) report. Available here."}, {"bbox": [85, 1550, 539, 1573], "category": "Footnote", "text": "¹² Cambodian Qualification Framework (CQF) 2, 3, 4."}, {"bbox": [85, 1573, 190, 1597], "category": "Footnote", "text": "¹³ CQF 5, 6."}, {"bbox": [85, 1597, 1145, 1647], "category": "Footnote", "text": "¹⁴ Data prepared for the SDG 4 Mid Term Review based on the nationally-representative Cambodian Socio-Economic Survey (CSES) confirms that the gender parity index has clearly shifted from 2015 to 2019 from 00 to 1.3 in favour of girls."}, {"bbox": [1038, 1682, 1145, 1707], "category": "Page-footer", "text": "Page 7 of 34"}]