During a recent conference in Brussels, the main international donors pledged to accelerate the procedures to reach the Millennium Objective for development, so that, by 2015, all children in the world be able to complete at least primary education. Today some 77 million children are completely excluded from any form of education at all. On behalf of the European Commission, the Commissioner for Development Louis Michel has announced the allocation of 1.7 billion euros for education from the European Development Fund (2007-2010) and the EU general budget, as well as from a special fund of 740 million for the ten-year educational plans of Ethiopia and Tanzania. The President of the World Bank, Paul Wolfowitz, has confirmed the pledge made in 2006 to increase investments by 50% within 3 years (1.12 billion euros for this year) for the 68 poorest countries. Numerous government delegations – including the UK, Holland, Portugal, Denmark, Norway, Germany, Japan and Bahrein – have offered supplementary aid. The conference was also attended by such NGOs as the Soros Foundation (which has made a donation of 3.7 million euros), Save the Children, Global Campaign for Education and World Economic Forum.
