School Education in Nigeria: Preparing for Universal Basic Education

Transcription

1 Nigeria School Education in Nigeria: Preparing for Universal Basic Education October 3, 2003 Human Development III Africa Region The World Bank

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3 Table of Contents Executive Summary... 1 Introduction...1 Some findings and implications...2 Data scarcity and the need for further analysis...6 The opportunity for reform...9 Chapter 1: The Political, Social, and Economic Environment for Educational Development... 3 Introduction...3 Political and administrative structure...4 Demographic structure...5 Economic growth and structure of employment...7 Poverty levels and well-being...12 Overview of government finance...14 Overview of public spending on education...18 Conclusions and some implications...20 Chapter 2: Educational Attainment, Enrollments, and Student Flows Educational attainment...21 Enrollments, Rates, and Student Flows From School-Based Data...26 Enrollments, Rates, and Student Flows Household Data...34 Probability model of ever attending school...45 Bringing together survival, completion, and transition rates...49 Conclusions and some implications...50 Chapter 3: Financing Education Funding governments and financing education...53 Sources of education funding and problems of aggregation...54 Education expenditures by source...56 Expenditures by level of education...66 The whole picture of education finance within states...68 Some aggregate estimates, comparisons and recent developments...69 Unit public cost by level of education...72 Private education and household expenditure...74 Conclusions and some implications...76 Chapter 4: Quality of Primary and Secondary Education and Learning Outcomes Structure and organization of the education system...81 Conditions in the primary schools...83 Conditions in the secondary schools...91 The quality of teaching and levels of learning...91 Conclusions and some implications...97 Chapter 5: Organizational and Institutional Issues Division of responsibility for education across governments Objectives and commitment in basic education Staffing the system Conclusions and some implications Chapter 6: Conclusion The wider environment Attainment, enrollment, and student flows Financing education and the levels and patterns of expenditure Quality of schooling and student outcomes iii

4 Organizational and institutional aspects Data and policy development Bibliography iv

5 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Introduction 1. For several years following independence, Nigerians were proud of their educational system and proud of being educated. The rapid development of primary schooling throughout the Western and Eastern regions in the 1950s and 1960s, the development of good-quality secondary grammar schools throughout the Federation, plus the expansion through the Ashby Commission of a university sector with half a dozen world-class universities all made this system one to be emulated. Over time, as the political economy of the country worsened, much of the system appeared to stagnate and, during some periods, contract. The reemergence of civilian government is raising hopes of an educational renaissance leading to higher levels of coverage and quality and ultimately to improved educational outcomes that will reduce the incidence of poverty, be rewarded in the labor market, redevelop national pride in the system and generally improve the nation s sense of well-being. 2. The purpose of this report is to make available some new information and analysis of the school system in Nigeria to those who will be making, interpreting, and implementing educational policy in the near future, at a time when the momentum for expansion and reform of the system is growing. This Summary presents some of the most important findings, raises some of the implications, and points to six areas where additional information and analysis would be useful. The report is divided into five main chapters, with an overview of each provided in chapter 6. The focus of each chapter is summarized briefly below. Chapter 1 discusses aspects of socioeconomic and political development that influence the educational system now and will continue to do so in the future: the political and administrative setting; population structure and projections; economic growth, the structure of employment, and the incidence of poverty; and government finances and aggregate public expenditures on education. Chapter 2 details the coverage and the internal efficiency of the school system using data from both school-based censuses and large household surveys. It provides estimates of the traditional measures of gross and net enrollment ratios and also of grade 1 entry, cycle survival, and cohort completion rates. The survey data allow many of the estimates to be disaggregated across gender, rural and urban location, geopolitical zone and household incomes. Chapter 3 describes the sources and mechanisms for financing the educational system across the three levels of government and attempts to provide estimates of the contributions of each level, aggregate education expenditures, and the expenditure patterns across primary, secondary, and tertiary education. This chapter also includes estimates of household expenditures on education and considers some of the issues involved in financing the national policy of Universal Basic Education. Chapter 4 focuses on some of the inputs into the school system. A particular emphasis is placed on teachers, including pupil:teacher ratios across states and local 1

6 governments, teacher qualifications, and the numbers of newly trained teachers relative to the demand. In addition, some of the results of recent classroom studies that have investigated teaching practices are reported. The chapter also provides evidence of levels of learning achievement, particularly in primary schools. Chapter 5 highlights some of the important and overarching organizational and institutional issues affecting the delivery of education. It focuses on the division of responsibilities across the school system among the three tiers of government; leadership and the setting of objectives, and the efficiency and behavior of the organizations that manage the system. Some findings and implications 3. A more extensive summary of the findings of the five main chapters are provided in the Conclusion to this report. Some of the important messages are highlighted below. 4. Education is important in reducing poverty - the increase in the incidence of poverty since the mid-1980s has affected all groups of people but those with higher levels of education the least. The proportion of households whose head has no education that are very poor is almost 50 percent higher than that of households whose head has a primary education. Further, the proportion of the population described as nonpoor in the educationally advanced South East zone is half that in the educationally underdeveloped North West. While urban unemployment rates are over 20 percent for each grouping of educated labor, average earnings of university graduates are 2.5 times higher than those of secondary school graduates. 5. The objectives of the Universal Primary Education Program launched in the mid- 1970s are close to being achieved for some groups of children but not for all. Across the country, roughly 79 percent of children enroll in class 1 and of these six out of every seven finish the primary cycle. Overall, around two thirds of all Nigerian children are completing a primary schooling and one third are not. There are wide variations in the completion rates across regions, gender, location and household incomes. In the three southern zones and North Central, the only groups of children whose entry rate to grade 1 is below 85 percent are rural boys living in the poorest 20 percent of households and rural girls living in the poorest 40 percent. In the North East, the highest rate is 78 percent for urban boys in the richest 20 percent of households; the lowest rate is 37 percent for the poorest quintile of rural girls. In the North West, the same groups of children have the highest and lowest rates, but in both cases the rates are lower - 58 percent and 19 percent, respectively. 6. Most states have either very high primary gross enrollment ratios or very low ones resulting in differences in medium term objectives. Recent school census data suggest overall gross enrollment rates for primary, junior secondary and senior secondary schooling of 91, 30 and 26 percent respectively. There are, however, very wide variations across states. Of the thirty states which existed in 1999, eighteen had gross enrollment ratios of over 100 percent while eight had ratios of below 40 2

7 percent. Only four states were in the range between 41 and 100 percent. The situation in the first set of states resembles that in countries such as Uganda, Zimbabwe and Botswana while that in the second is closer to countries such as Niger, Chad and Burkina Faso. In some states, the appropriate medium term target is universal basic education while in other states it remains universal primary education. Any national programs to improve access to schooling need to recognize this strong distinction. Those states which are aiming to universalize junior secondary schooling in the medium term will need to decide whether this is to be the terminal level of schooling for some groups of children. 7. The large differences between the gross and net enrollment ratios, and the very large number of overage children in each class, suggest high levels of repetition and/or of dropout and reentry but these data are not collected. The difference between the gross and net primary enrollment ratios is very large (around 30 percentage points) which suggests a high level of overage enrollment. In fact, 52 percent of grade 6 pupils are over the age of 12 years and 56 percent of grade 9 pupils are over the age of 15 years. The reasons for overage enrollments are a mixture of overage enrollment in class 1, dropout and reentry, and class repetition. The higher the rate of repetition, the higher the cost of producing each graduate of the cycle, and the wider the age range within a class, the harder the teacher s job. Information on repetition and on dropout and reentry are not available in Nigeria, even from the recently improved school census. This constrains the ability to understand the size of the problem, to analyze the implications for school efficiency and outcomes, or to develop policies to reduce the problem. 8. The transition rate from primary to junior secondary schooling is low according to school-based data though higher according to household survey data: the retention rate throughout the full secondary cycle is high. Available school-based data imply transition rates from the final year of primary to the first year of junior secondary of between 37 and 55 percent through the 1990s, but the rate for 2002 is just 34 percent. These rates suggest that less than one third of all children enter secondary school. However, two sets of household survey data report that almost half of all 20 to 29 year olds have completed junior secondary schooling ranging from 20 percent in the North West to 63 percent in the South West. For those states planning to universalize junior secondary schooling, a greater accuracy in the school censuses is now imperative. However, it is already clear that while the transition rate is relatively low in most states, the survival rate is high. Once enrolled in a junior secondary school, the probability of graduating from senior secondary appears to be around 75 to 80 percent. 9. Levels of learning achievement in schools appear to be low and the causes require more systematic attention. Learning achievement tests undertaken by primary class 4 pupils in 1996 and class 5 pupils in 2002 show poor results. The average scores in 1996 were 32 percent for numeracy and 25 percent for language, while in 2002, only 20 percent were able to answer more than a third of the language test items correctly. An exercise comparing the 1996 results with those in 12 other African countries, found the performance in Nigeria to be the worst. In the senior secondary examination, the effective pass rates between 1998 and 2001 have averaged below 40 percent in all major subjects apart from Nigerian languages, and have been particularly 3

8 low in English language. All studies of the conditions in schools point to a severe lack of teaching-learning materials and to physical conditions which impede effective learning. 10. There are no accurate estimates of total public expenditure on education in Nigeria because of a lack of information on state government sectoral expenditures, but rough estimates point to an overall decline over recent decades and to an overemphasis on tertiary education. Since state governments do not report their sectoral expenditures to the federal government there are no accurate estimates of their expenditures on education. As they fund almost all of secondary education, a large part of tertiary education and some part of primary this is a serious gap. The results of case studies of twelve states suggest that education expenditures across all federal, state, and local governments in 1998 were 14.5 percent of total expenditures and 2.3 percent of gross domestic product. If accurate, these estimates point to a significant decline over previous decades and compare poorly to the situation in most other African countries. They also suggest a much higher than normal share for tertiary education. The large salary increases since 1998 are estimated to have raised the share of total expenditure to around 17.5 percent, which is much closer to the African average, but the data remain poor and it is not clear how the allocations have changed across levels. 11. There are very large differences between states and between local governments in their efforts to fund education. The share of total expenditure which is spent on education varies significantly. From the twelve case studies, the median share of total expenditure spent on education by state governments in 1999 was 18 percent. However, in five of the states the share was over 25 percent while in four it was below 14 percent. Similarly, in 2002, for a different set of 12 states, four devoted over 50 percent of their personnel expenditures to education while five devoted less than 33 percent. Differences across local governments are even wider. In 2001, while on average 51 percent of the Federation Account allocation to local governments was deducted at source for teacher salaries, the variation across states was from 25 to 80 percent. In all, local governments of 13 states had over 60 percent deducted while in 10 states the deduction was below 40 percent. 12. The recently recommended increase in the share of the Federation Account allocated to state governments would allow them to allocate more resources to education. An increase in the share of the Federation Account allocated to state governments from 24 percent to 33 percent was recommended by the Fiscal Commission in 2002, but has not yet been ratified by the federal legislature. While the states have a wide range of responsibilities and in several cases have not been able to meet their obligations (including paying the salaries of secondary school teachers), this would be a significant increase and one which would allow though not ensure - all states to improve nonsalary allocations to the education sector and to hire additional teachers in those states with high pupil:teacher ratios and low coverage. 13. The draft Universal Basic Education Act indicates that the federal government intends to allocate grants to states as a first charge on its own consolidated revenue fund. The use of a first charge, the total amounts involved, the criteria for distribution, and the requirements placed on the states need to be carefully assessed. 4

9 The circumstances in which a first charge on the budget are justifiable are generally regarded as few. It is not clear why the Ministry of Finance has acquiesced in this case. In addition, given the very poor information available on educational expenditures (particularly for the junior secondary cycle of basic education) it is perhaps premature to specify a fixed proportion of federal government revenues for this purpose. The criteria to be used for allocating grants across states are not included in the draft act. The challenge is to avoid rewarding states and local governments that are unwilling to use their own resources for education or penalizing those that already allocate relatively large shares of their revenues. Finally, there is the question of what would be required of the state governments in terms of plans, outcomes, and reforms in exchange for the grants. Such specific-purpose grants are not uncommon in other federal countries, including for universalizing schooling. It may be useful for the federal government to gain a greater understanding of how other countries have approached these issues. 14. While universalizing primary education across all states, and basic education in some states, over the next few years will require additional teachers, classrooms, and materials, and therefore additional financial resources, there is considerable scope for increasing efficiency in the delivery of schooling. A more efficient use of resources could be achieved through measures such as rationalizing the allocation of teachers, reducing repetition and improving pupil flows within cycles, and increasing teacher productivity. The current allocation of teachers is inefficient and inequitable. While the overall pupil:teacher ratio in primary schooling is close to the norm, there are wide variations across the states. In a third, the ratio is below 30 and there are too many teachers, while in a further third the ratio is above 50 and there are too few. The state averages also hide very wide variations across local governments and schools. For 10 states, the average range of the pupil:teacher ratio across local governments is 22 to 78. The widest range within a state is 14 to 96. Repetition and dropout/reentry raise the costs of producing school graduates. Repetition increases the total number of children enrolled and may then justify an additional teacher in the school. Alternatively, it reduces the amount of time a teacher can give to each pupil, and may result in overcrowding in general. In both cases it results in a wider range of ages in the classroom which may increase the problems forteachers. Overall, either costs increase or the quality of teaching suffers. The effectiveness of teachers could be increased. Teachers have few materials with which to complement their skills, and there is no rolling plan to produce and distribute additional materials. Between 1994 and 2001, across 26 states, the allocation for instructional materials was equal to just 1.5 percent of total expenditure on primary schooling. Recent research studies plus the very poor results from achievement tests in literacy point to significant problems in implementing the national policy on the language of instruction. Other studies on the use instructional time also suggest it would be possible to make teachers more effective. There is very little opportunity for in-service training. Less than 0.2 percent of total primary expenditures are for this purpose. 5

10 15. The system could also achieve more if it were more effectively organized. Federal political systems are always more complicated to organize than unitary ones but have the potential to be more effective in the delivery of services. Currently in Nigeria this potential is not being achieved. There are several examples of, on the one hand, duplication and on the other a reluctance to be accountable across the three tiers of government. Currently, there are moves to restructure the management of primary education and to place the state governments at the center. Similar issues might also be raised regarding secondary and, more important, tertiary education. Currently, both the federal and state governments operate and fund universities, teacher training colleges. and polytechnics/senior technical colleges. Just as there are large differences across states and local governments in pupil:teacher ratios, there are wide differences in the size of the nonteaching workforce in the organizations managing the system. Data scarcity and the need for further analysis 16. The scarcity of data and the very limited amount of existing analysis of key aspects of the educational system, and of its impact on socioeconomic development in Nigeria, have limited the scope of this report. More important, they limit the ability of those who make, interpret, and implement policy in the federal and state governments to undertake their own analyses of the dynamics of the educational system, design new interventions, and gauge their effects. During the preparation of this report, six areas have been identified for additional data/analysis/policy development: (1) reasons for differences in access, survival, and transition rates across different groups of children; (2) expenditures on education, patterns of distribution, and greater resource efficiency; (3) the overall effectiveness of teachers in schools; (4) levels of learning achievement and the constraints to learning; (5) distribution of authority across the educational system and the effectiveness of organizations within each of the three tiers of government; and (6) experiences of the graduates of each level of the educational system in the labor market and the implications for what is taught, the rate of expansion, and the sharing of costs. Each of these is discussed further below. Access, survival and transition rates 17. Now that the data on primary and secondary school enrollments are becoming available through the 2002 School Census, with a higher level of certainty than in the past, it will be important to delve deeper into these data to understand better the patterns of student flows and the efficiency of the educational system. In these efforts it is important to move away from the traditional gross and net enrollment ratios toward measuring the intake, survival, and completion rates for each cycle of schooling. As the Universal Basic Education program develops, it will be necessary to focus even more on rates of completion of primary schooling and of junior secondary schooling, depending on the state. Currently, the lack of data on repetition and reentry rates makes it difficult to understand student flows. The large difference between the transition rate from primary to secondary schooling implied by the household surveys and by the school-based enrollment data suggest that these rates may be high. If so, this is an indication that efficiency could be increased, with significant financial implications, and that the proportion of young adults who complete the primary cycle and enter secondary school is higher than the 25 to 30 percent currently assumed. For states 6

11 whose immediate goal is to universalize the junior secondary cycle, this issue is particularly important to resolve. It is essential to allocate resources (human and financial) to adequately analyze the data from the new school census, and to plan for the census to be maintained. 18. There are still wide variations in access to schooling for children in different states and, within states, often across income groups. In particular, within the North West and North East zones there is a group of states where the enrollment rates remain very low. Much more needs to be known about the reasons for this situation. In all states, rural children in the poorest 20 percent of households have much lower participation rates. While the rates in the highest four household income quintiles are above the average for African countries, the rate in the lowest quintile is below the average. More needs to be known about the constraints on these children and how they can be reduced. 19. In the northern states the immediate challenges are to ensure that all children enroll in grade 1 and complete the full primary cycle. In the southern states, the challenges are to quickly meet those targets and to move on to universalizing a full basic education. This second part will require an important decision. Currently fewer than half of all children enter the first grade of junior secondary school. However, once there, the probability of completing the full six year secondary cycle is high. The question, therefore, is whether the universalization of basic education implies that junior secondary is to be the final educational level for a large proportion of the population of young adults or whether the current junior to secondary school transition rate is to be maintained so as to universalize a full secondary education and a 12-year cycle of schooling. The latter would require a very large financial commitment. Either decision would have significant implications for curriculum design, pupil testing, and teacher development. Expenditures on education, patterns of distribution, and greater cost effectiveness 20. The second major area where additional information is required is expenditures on education. The immediate need is to develop information on state government expenditures, both through their ministries and their parastatals, including tertiary institutions. Without this information, it is not possible to understand the national effort being made, the distribution of expenditures across levels of education, or the relative inputs of the three tiers of government. In turn, the development of holistic sector development strategies and plans, nationally and for individual states, is not possible. More detailed knowledge of expenditures, and of unit costs at each level, would also provide the information for assessing the equity of the current pattern of financing and would allow for estimations to be made of the impact of increasing efficiency and accelerating the flow of pupils through the cycles. One result of the current situation is the difficulty of producing realistic assessments of the costs of universalizing basic education and its potential impact on funding for the rest of the educational system. More detailed cost information could be used to understand more fully the cost-effectiveness of altering various inputs into the system. 21. An improved system for collecting, collating, and analyzing information on expenditures in the states is needed for both the federal and state governments. At present there is no constitutional requirement for states even to report their sectoral budgetary transactions to the federal government, though this situation may change if the Fiscal Responsibility Act becomes law. The institution best placed to undertake the systematic collection of education expenditure data is probably the Central Bank in coordination with the Policy, Research and Statistics department of the Federal Ministry of Education. 7

12 Effectiveness of teachers 22. Analyses of education expenditures, and projections of additional expenditures that will be required to reach the universalization targets, need to be complemented by efforts to improve the ways resources in the system are currently used. The most important, and expensive, of these resources are teachers. There are at least three sets of gaps in data and/or understanding in this regard: the labor market for teachers and the minimum conditions necessary for their recruitment in sufficient numbers; causes of the very wide pupil:teacher ratios both between states and between local governments within states; and the existing, and optimal, amounts of teaching materials in the classrooms that are available to increase teacher effectiveness. 23. The first of these requires analysis of the conditions of employment of government teachers (and lecturers) compared to similarly qualified government employees, and of similarly qualified teachers in private schools and tertiary institutions. It also requires an investigation of the level of applications to teacher training courses, particularly since the salary increases, in conjunction with both the additional demands that will result from measures to universalize schooling and the current pupil:teacher ratios. The current ratios will need some further documentation, especially between local governments and between schools, followed by investigations of how and why the discrepancies occur. Improving the rationality of teacher allocation is possibly the single most important action required to improve both efficiency and equity. The third of the major gaps covers teaching materials, which are necessary to increase the productivity of the teachers. The initial data source is the school census. Once that has been analyzed, some more detailed surveys may be needed to assess what is available, what is used, and what is most useful. Levels of learning achievement 24. The tests of learning achievement given to primary school pupils have produced poor results. Since Nigeria has better than average pupil:teacher ratios, this is particularly disturbing. An important aspect of the tests is that they have been administered in English. Both urban children and those in private schools have performed better than others, perhaps reflecting the more widespread use of English in their everyday life. The results point to the need to revisit policies on the language of instruction together with the availability of materials, and to give further thought to the nature and language of the instruments in the learning achievement tests. There is still a great deal that is not known about the levels of children s learning in schools and the factors that are constraining it. Distribution of authority and effectiveness of organizations 25. Over the past quarter-century, there have been many changes in the ways primary schooling is managed and funded. The lack of stability and clarity continues to be detrimental to the development of this subsector. The Supreme Court rulings in 2002 and the draft 8

13 legislation for the Universal Basic Education Act are again redefining the roles of the federal and state governments in primary education and the ways in which all levels of government will relate. Attention might next shift to secondary and tertiary levels of education. In secondary schooling, the federal unity colleges were begun several decades ago with a multiplicity of objectives. At the least, these objectives might be reexamined to determine if they are still relevant. In tertiary education, both the federal and state governments manage and finance similar types of institutions within the same states--teacher training colleges, polytechnics or senior technical colleges, and universities. In addition, there is a growing number of private institutions, particularly private universities, and several firms have their own training programs. Once clarity has been brought to the primary level, it may be appropriate for the federal and state governments to develop a holistic tertiary education plan for the country. Education and the labor market 26. One of the principal motivations of governments in providing educational services, particularly beyond the basic cycle, and of children and households demanding them, is the expectation of higher levels of labor productivity and income. However, there are very few data and little analysis of the relationship between education and the labor market. Studies of the incidence of poverty have shown lower levels on average for households headed by higher educated adults, and the urban surveys of the National Manpower Board have found positive associations between education and earnings, but hard information is very scanty. Anecdotal evidence from a limited survey of employers undertaken for the National Universities Commission in 2000 indicated that they found most tertiary graduates unprepared for employment, while in the South East zone, secondary school enrollment ratios are higher for females and suggestions are made that males see greater profit in immediate employment. But again, hard evidence is limited. In the 1960s and 1970s, the National Manpower Board regularly published the results of surveys focusing on labor market demand and the outputs of training institutions. These surveys have become fewer and fewer. For secondary and tertiary education, a more detailed understanding of the experiences of graduates would be useful in order to provide a more solid basis for discussions of what is taught, at what rate each subsector should expand, and how the costs might be shared between governments, students and households. The opportunity for reform 27. The momentum for expansion and reform of the educational system in Nigeria is growing. The federal government has committed to the Education For All targets, which include universal primary education by 2015, and is fully engaged in the international dialogue surrounding this program. In addition, and reflecting the educational diversity across the country, President Obasanjo in 1999 launched the Universal Basic Education Program, which covers both primary and junior secondary schooling. Simultaneously, as part of the overall discussion on the relative roles of the federal and state governments in Nigeria and the recent legal rulings that have defined these roles in primary schooling more clearly, many of the state governments are also increasing their focus on education. In the past few months there has been a move, stimulated through the Education For All movement, to mobilize both state governments and civil society in discussions on education and to begin formulating subsector programs. As new federal and state governments take on the responsibilities of power for the next four years in a context in which the momentum for change in the 9

14 education sector is accelerating, and some deadlines for action are drawing near, it is intended that this report will be a useful input into the debate. 10

15 INTRODUCTION This report is one of a series being initiated by the World Bank to diagnose the current status of the education system of selected African countries. The focus of this particular report on Nigeria is on the school system including its coverage, efficiency, financing, management, within-school delivery and outcomes. Tertiary education, in the main, is not included apart from some considerations of teacher training and the position of the sub sector in the overall pattern of educational finance. The momentum for expansion and reform of the educational system in Nigeria is growing. The federal government has committed to the Education for All targets which include universal primary education by 2015 and is fully engaged in the international dialogue surrounding this program. In addition, and reflecting the educational diversity across the country, President Obasango In 1999 launched the Universal Basic Education Programme which covers both primary and junior secondary schooling. Simultaneously, as part of the overall discussion on the relative roles of the federal and state governments in Nigeria and the recent legal rulings which have defined these rules in primary schooling more clearly in the context of the 1999 Constitution, many of the state governments are also increasing their focus on the education sector. In the past few months there has been a move, stimulated by the Education for All program, to mobilize both state governments and civil society in discussions of education and to begin the formulation of sub sector programs. As new federal and state governments take on the responsibilities of power for the next four years in a context in which the momentum for change in the education sector is accelerating, and some deadlines for action are drawing near, it is hoped that this report will be a useful added input into the debate. The diversity of educational development in Nigeria is very wide and very important to recognize. While an effort has been made to reflect this in the report, only a start has been made. The report, however, does point to issues and indicates types of analyses which could be taken up by individual state governments. This raises the issue of good quality data, made available in a timely way. The immediate needs are for information which will allow for a more detailed analysis and understanding of student flows through the system and of patterns of public expenditures. The raw results of the 2002 School Census which are now becoming available will be helpful but a comprehensive program to analyze them is required together with initiatives to aggregate and analyze education expenditures. Equally important will be efforts to improve the management of each tier of the system, and to identify ways in which existing resources can be used more productively. 1

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17 CHAPTER 1: THE POLITICAL, SOCIAL, AND ECONOMIC ENVIRONMENT FOR EDUCATIONAL DEVELOPMENT Introduction 1.1 The coverage of education in a particular country at a particular moment in time is influenced by many factors. In the absence of compulsory schooling, children attend school because they choose to, or the choice is made for them, and the facilities are available. The costs and difficulties of attending school, and the benefits that are expected to result, affect the demand for schooling. In turn, these are influenced by poverty and income levels of households, the importance given to literacy, and expectations regarding how schooling will improve children s life chances. The importance given by governments to raise educational levels, the availability of government resources, and competing demands influence supply in the public sector. This chapter introduces several factors outside of the education system that influences its development in Nigeria. 1.2 The Federal Republic of Nigeria is the most highly populated country on the African continent with an estimated total of 132 million. Of these, around 73 million are below the age of 20 and, until recently, had never lived under a civilian government. Indeed, in the first 39 years following Independence in 1960, the military ruled for 29 of them. Since 1999, however, a civilian government has been in place and the first handover of power to a new government (though from the same party) occurred in April/May The system of governance is presidential and federal. Over the past four decades, the original three large regional entities that existed at the time of Independence have been subdivided to a current total of 36 states, plus the Federal Capital Territory of Abuja. Within the states there is a total of 774 local government areas. 1.3 The monetary economy is dominated by the oil and gas sector. Since the early 1970s, this sector has contributed a significant proportion of gross domestic product (GDP) (generally percent) and its impact on the revenues of all levels of government has been even greater (currently averaging over 80 percent). In spite of this potential engine for economic growth, real GDP has increased relatively slowly (for example, by around just 2.4 percent a year over the 1990s) and there has been little growth in per capita income. The current estimate is US$290, which compares with an estimate of US$1,100 for 1980 (World Bank 1996). Since 1997 the non-oil economy that directly provides employment and income to most Nigerians has been increasing at an annual average rate of 3.9 percent. 1.4 Volatility in oil revenues is large and, correspondingly, so is the share of government revenues in GDP. In 1997 and 2001, consolidated revenue shares were 20 percent and 47 percent respectively. Overall, the average share is much higher than in most other African countries. 1 And it is the competition for these revenues among the three tiers of government and particularly between the federal and state governments that has defined the political relationships over the years. Between 1960 and 1991, for instance, the formulae for sharing 1 Across all Sub-Saharan African countries the average share of government expenditure in GDP between 1990 and 1999 was 29.2 percent (World Bank 2001, table 7.4). 3

18 revenues were altered 16 times. Large governments together with limited public accountability, particularly under military governments, have also encouraged high levels of corruption. 1.5 Following the large increase in the number of states, the country has been sub-divided into six geographic-political zones. While the source of a major share of GDP and public revenues is centralized, there are wide socio-economic differences across the country with the three southern and North Central zones enjoying higher indicators in virtually all aspects of well-being, including education, health, and the proportion of the population estimated to be living in poverty. In addition to socio-economic differences, the population is divided roughly equally between Christians and Muslims. In general this mirrors a south-north divide, although not entirely. Finally, within states there is often significant ethnic heterogeneity. Three major groups dominate: the Hausa/Fulani, Yoruba, and Igbo with the remainder of the population spread across some 350 others. Interethnic rivalries, particularly in the so-called middle belt and in the oil producing areas, have intensified in recent years resulting in considerable violence. 1.6 Many of the significant gains in social development that accrued in the first 25 years of independence were given up, or at best stagnated, during the last decade and a half of military rule. These included school enrollments, infant mortality, life expectancy, fertility rates, and access to improved water sources. The atmosphere in Nigeria in 1999 was that of a post-conflict society and, as one example, commentators regularly described the government education system as broken at all levels. Since the inauguration of the civilian government, the situation has exhibited some signs of improvement and there is a greater willingness among public officials to face issues with a more reasonable expectation that positive changes can be made. To develop this willingness further, there is a need for a more detailed understanding of the current levels of social and economic development. This report contributes to such an effort for the education system. In its preparation, however, it soon became clear that there are significant barriers even to gaining a good approximation of the situation. It is, for example, extremely difficult to assess the coverage of the primary and secondary education system; its efficiency and effectiveness; the levels and distributions of financial resources; and the patterns of staffing. The education system is too important to be operated and planned on the basis of the limited amount of good quality information that currently exists. 1.7 In this introductory chapter, some of the major factors that impinge on the education system are discussed further. These include the political and administrative setting, particularly as it affects the delivery of education; the level and age distribution of the population and the projected changes over the next two decades; the structure and dynamics of the economy and related employment and earnings patterns; the nature of Nigeria s system of fiscal federalism and trends in federal, state, and local government revenues and expenditures; and some initial considerations of the sources, levels, and distributions of public expenditure on education. Some of these factors are examined in greater detail in subsequent chapters. Political and administrative structure 1.8 Nigeria is a federal republic and the current administrative and political structure is based on the 1999 Constitution. The system is presidential with states run by directly elected 4

19 governors and with federal and state houses of assembly. Ministers in the federal and state governments are appointed by the president and governors respectively and are not necessarily, in fact are rarely, elected members of the houses of assembly. 1.9 An important characteristic of the Constitution is that many of the powers given to the states are exercised concurrently with the federal government. Alongside this, local governments can only exercise authority in accordance with enabling legislation passed by the states. This has led to a continuing debate over which tier of government, particularly federal or state, is best equipped to deal with various areas of policy and service provision and whether the division of government resources is appropriate At Independence, the federal government was relatively weak in relation to the three virtually autonomous regional political entities, each with a different ethnic base and its own revenue base (World Bank 2002a). Over time, and particularly during the long periods of military rule, and as a result of the division of the large regions and the proliferation of states, the power of the federal government grew. The return of civilian rule is beginning to alter this relationship between the federal government and the states. State governments are increasingly challenging the center by demanding greater devolution of powers with a commensurate increase in resources. In the absence of a forum for reallocating powers, the states have been increasing pressure for changes in the formula for allocating centrally collected revenues. Because this source of revenue dominates the overall revenues of each level of government, its distribution is the prime determinant of the relative distribution of political power in the federation. The allocations among the three tiers of government, as well as between states and between local governments, are determined by formulae that although changeable have a legal basis. Allocations are a right, and not a transfer from one tier of government to another. Unlike in several federations in both industrial and developing countries, there are few transfers from the central government to state governments to support activities implemented by the states. There are, however, institutions located in the states that are owned and funded by the federal government As the number of states and, particularly, local governments has increased over time so has a concern over their ability to carry out some of the service delivery functions. A central point emphasized in this report is that the way in which the forces determining the distribution of powers and resources between the federal and state governments play out in the coming few years could have a profound effect on the management, resourcing, and outcomes of the education system. Demographic structure 1.12 Census results in Nigeria have been contentious and, at times, have not been accepted by the government of the day. The most recent Census in 1991 provided an aggregate figure of 89 million, which was accepted by government. Fertility rates remain very high at 5.1 and the post-census enumeration survey estimated a population growth for the mid-1990s of 3.1 percent (National Population Commission, 2000). Projections made by the Population Commission indicate a total population for 2003 of 135 million Fertility rates show relatively little variation across the urban and rural populations but on average, women in the north will have two more children than those in the rest of the country. Compared with many other African, and particularly non-african, countries the 5

20 fertility rate continues to decline only marginally by level of education from 6.1 for those women with no schooling to 4.9 for those with a completed secondary schooling (table 1.1). However, while the geographic and educational differences in fertility rates are relatively small, they are increasing. Variations in the number of children ever born to women in the various groups aged years are much smaller. Table 1.1. Fertility Rates by Background Characteristics of Women, 1999 Characteristic Total Fertility Rate Children ever born women years Urban Rural Northeast Northwest Southeast Southwest Central No education Primary Secondary Higher Total Source: National Population Commission 2000, table Changes in birth rates can have dramatic effects on the number of school-age children. In many Latin American and Asian countries, the numbers are falling thereby reducing the potential demand for education services. Across Africa this trend is less evident and the projections of age groups for Nigeria show increasing numbers of children who will be requiring education over the next three decades. The current birth rate is estimated at 3.9 percent falling to around 2.6 percent by Table 1.2 presents estimates of the school-age groups up to Not until after 2030 is the size of the primary school age group (6 11 years) expected to decrease and, in the meantime, the increases are quite large. Between 2005 and 2030 the number is expected to increase by more than 5 million. The age group associated with junior-secondary schooling will not begin to decrease until after 2035 and that with senior secondary schooling until three years later. As a whole, the public finance gains resulting from declining school-age groups common in many countries are not anticipated to accrue to Nigeria for at least another three decades. At their peaks, the number of children in the primary, junior-secondary, and senior-secondary age ranges will be 20 percent, 37 percent, and 54 percent higher respectively than in 2005, posing particular problems for the provision of secondary schooling. Across states, however, there will be differences because, as shown in table 1.1, the fertility rate varies from 4.5 in the Central and South West regions to 6.8 in the North East. Unfortunately, it is in those states where educational coverage is lowest that birth rates are highest. On a more positive note, while the school-age population continues to grow, so too does the labor force, and at a faster rate. The proportion of the total population aged between 20 and 60 years is projected to increase from 40.0 percent in 2000 to 47.4 percent in