CONFINTEA VI Mid-Term Review

Foreword

With the benefits of adult learning and education firmly established by evidence-based research, the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning (UIL) is mandated to help ensure that appropriate Adult Learning and Education (ALE) policies are designed and developed, while Member States’ capacities to implement them are being strengthened.

As the new UIL Director a.i., I am looking forward to supporting UIL’s work for the coming months according to this mandate.

It gives me great pleasure to present this special issue of the CONFINTEA VI Follow-up Bulletin, only a few weeks before the CONFINTEA VI Mid-Term Review, which will take place in the city of Suwon, Republic of Korea (25–27 October 2017). This meeting will provide the necessary platform for dialogue among Member States and their governmental and non-governmental actors and stakeholders. The purpose is to reaffirm a common vision towards CONFINTEA VII in 2021 in the context of Education 2030 and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). To that end, this meeting will also review and examine progress concerning the implementation of the Belém Framework for Action since 2009.

Our commitment to improving ALE policies, concepts and practices across the globe will bring tangible benefits to people’s lives, and as we prepare for the future, these efforts will lead to closer cooperation between local and international actors in the field of ALE.

I am very much looking forward to welcoming you to the City of Suwon this autumn in order to shape a collective new approach to ALE and foster global cooperation.