© UNESCO
The Sixth International Conference on Adult Education (CONFINTEA VI), which took place in northern Brazil in December 2009, underscored with an overwhelming consensus the central role of adult education in helping adults gain the necessary knowledge and skills to adjust to, shape and develop their environments in a globalised, accelerated and interconnected world. Twelve years after the much-acclaimed Hamburg Declaration and Agenda for the Future, CONFINTEA VI adopted a re-focused and strengthened charter to make literacy, education and learning throughout life a reality for adults: the Belém Framework for Action. The Framework calls for adult education to be recognised as an indispensable component of lifelong learning, of which literacy is the foundation.
UIL’s strategic goal is, hence, to ensure that adult education is recognised, developed from a lifelong perspective and integrated into sector-wide strategies and development agendas. A special effort is directed at articulating with the Education for All (EFA) agenda and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), where adult education has been neglected or not even considered.
With the momentum gained through CONFINTEA VI, UIL is pursuing the adult education agenda and focusing on the implementation of the Belém Framework for Action. This includes advocacy and communication, as well as the international coordination of the follow-up process, the search for the best strategies and the development of tools.
