6th High Level Dialogue, 5th Feb. 2022
“Developing Africa's human, social and economic capital by increasing resilience of African girls through quality nutrition and education”
CALL TO ACTION
Recalling that the event took place on 5th February 2022, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on the margins of the 35th AU Summit of Heads of States and Government at Hilton Hotel, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia with the participation of Ministries of Sierra Leone, Senegal, Uganda, Ethiopia and AU Member States represented by their Embassies in Ethiopia and High officials from AUC Departments of ESTI, ARBE, Norway and Canada Embassies, UN Agencies and several Developments partners advocating for respect and promotion of girls and women’s right to education as well their empowerment trough quality nutrition as a driver for a quality education.
Applauding the AU/CIEFFA’s annual High-level Dialogue respectively held since 2017 in accordance with each AU Theme of the year to ensure gender-responsive education is fully mainstreamed into each AU development programs and projects and reflected in the AU Assembly’s Decisions.
Congratulating the AU Member States for sharing their countries’ best practices and success stories on School Feeding Programs and their impacts on girls’ and women’s enrolment training and resilience; as well how the AU & WFP« Home Grown School Feeding », is used as a strategy to retain girls in school.
Congratulating the Government of Sierra Leone and all AU Member States for their full commitment to advance Girls’ education in the continent with the technical support of the AU-CIEFFA under the AUC Department of Education, Science, Technology and Innovation (ESTI) including all stakeholders advocating for girls ‘education agenda at all levels to reach Agenda 2063 and the SDG 4.
Considering that girls’ education is paramount to achieve the sustainable development goals of ensuring inclusive, equitable quality education and promoting lifelong learning for all children, to empower girls and communities and to break the cycle of poverty;
Noting with concern that progress made in girls’ education is placed under an unprecedented threat due to the COVID-19 pandemic and its disproportionate negative impact on girls’ development and agency,
Call Upon all of our fellow AU Member States, the WFP and all state and non-state actors with the technical support of the AU/CIEFFA to:
1. Invest in human capital through quality nutrition to enable it to generate growth and drive Africa's development, for and with all relevant stakeholders by creating resource envelopes, nutrition in schools and education institutions in order to achieve the Africa that we want by 2063.
2. Develop & Adopt an AU Gender-responsive School Feeding Strategy to retain girls in school in all AU Member States and to propose educational measures that build the nutritional resilience of Africans and ensure that this continental strategy will be accompanying by agri-food chains with incentives for girls and young women in educational institutions
3. Advocate for more girls in STEM fields in order to have more African female scientists, more female innovators resolving our climate change issues; more female engineers creating sustainable infrastructure for water, energy and digital tools; more female agronomists supporting small scale female farmers to produce enough food in Africa, from Africa and for Africa.
4. Recommend the Government of Sierra Leone to champion the African Union Agenda on girls’ education with the support of all AU Member States and all the Organs of the Union, the RECs and all stakeholders & advocates through the technical support of the AU/International Centre for Girls & Women’s in Africa (AU/CIEFFA)
Done in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on 05Th February 2022
