Tight budgets, high stakes: Why education financing matters more than ever

Economic shocks and increasing geopolitical tensions are putting pressure on public budgets worldwide. Governments across the Global South face mounting debt burdens, while donor countries are tightening aid envelopes. Hard choices are being made. Many priorities compete for attention. But education must remain at the top of the list. 

The case is compelling. Education is one of the strongest engines of inclusive growth and long-term prosperity. One additional year of schooling can increase an individual’s earnings by close to 10%. Educating girls reduces child marriage, improves health outcomes, strengthens labour force participation and drives wage equality. Over time, ensuring all children acquire quality education and relevant skills can dramatically boost national income and resilience. In a volatile world, education is not a luxury — it is foundational for equality, inclusion, stability, growth and security. 

That is why partnership and pooled financing for education matter more than ever. The Global Partnership for Education (GPE) is the world’s largest multilateral fund dedicated exclusively to transforming education systems in lower-income countries. It brings together more than 90 partner countries and multiple bilateral and multilateral donors, including Canada, the United Kingdom, the European Union, the World Bank and others, around nationally led education plans. The GPE supports ministries of education to design and implement coherent sector-wide reforms, to improve quality and access to education. 

This model is especially important in constrained fiscal times. Pooling resources reduces duplication, aligns donor support behind country priorities and strengthens system-level impact. At a moment when GPE is mobilizing its replenishment to support 750 million children, sustained and expanded donor backing is essential. 

While financing matters, leadership from the Global South is equally important. GPE works directly with ministries of education to strengthen national ownership and support countries to build systems that reflect their realities and ambitions. Those closest to an education challenge are best placed to define problems and design solutions. 

In an era of tight financing, we must build on what works. Evidence is crucial. 

That is where Canada’s IDRC plays a distinctive role through the Global Partnership for Education Knowledge and Innovation Exchange (GPE KIX), a joint initiative of GPE and IDRC. 

KIX is GPE’s engine for evidence-informed policy and practice. It has two core functions. First, it tests and scales proven innovations. KIX supports rigorous, Southern-led research partnerships that generate practical evidence on how to improve foundational learning, teacher professional development, girls’ education and education technology, and education for kids with disabilities — and how to scale these approaches sustainably within national systems. 

In Lesotho, for example, KIX-supported research helped elevate early childhood education within national policy. Evidence informed the development of an advocacy strategy and a practical financing guide, integrating early childhood education into the country’s education sector plan for the first time. The result: strengthened policy coherence and the mobilization of USD5.5-million (CAD7.48-million) in additional external financing. This is what evidence-to-investment looks like. 

KIX-funded work has also supported the scaling of the Campaign for Female Education’s Learner Guide model in Tanzania and Zimbabwe. By equipping young women with mentoring, leadership and life skills — embedded within schools — the program improves retention and strengthens long-term economic participation. Crucially, evidence generated with national stakeholders has informed broader system uptake, demonstrating how locally grounded innovation can shape national reform. 

Second, KIX operates through regional hubs to identify priority evidence gaps defined by policymakers, synthesize and mobilize research, and facilitate peer learning across countries. Across Africa, the Indo-Pacific region, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Latin America and the Caribbean, these hubs work with researchers, local education groups — including civil society, teacher organizations and ministries of education — and serve as active brokers between research and policy. 

Through the Latin America and Caribbean hub, policymakers in Honduras engaged in South–South exchanges and drew on KIX-supported research to strengthen internal research capacity and foster a stronger culture of evidence use within the Ministry of Education. Insights from regional peers informed elements of teacher training reform — illustrating how shared knowledge can translate into concrete policy change. 

IDRC is proud to support GPE KIX because in a fiscally constrained world, this model aligns three imperatives: pooled financing, Southern leadership and evidence-informed scaling. Development investments must be catalytic, grounded in partnership and informed by evidence. GPE KIX accompanies countries as they identify solutions, test them rigorously and scale what works, to improve inclusive, equitable learning. 

As GPE advances its replenishment campaign, the stakes are high. Education systems are under strain from conflict, climate shocks, demographic pressures and rapid technological change. At the same time, there is extraordinary innovation emerging across Africa, South Asia and Latin America — locally driven, practical and ambitious. 

Backing GPE — and strengthening initiatives like KIX — is a strategic investment in shared prosperity and stability. In a world preoccupied with trade, defence and security, we should remember: few investments contribute more to long-term peace and resilience than quality education systems that equip young people with skills, opportunity and hope, and lead to economic growth and jobs. 

Even in tight times — especially in tight times — that is a priority worth defending.