Het Koninklijk Huis
Toespraak van Prinses Laurentien tijdens opening UNDP conferentie over
armoede, Rotterdam, 24 februari 2010
De toespraak is uitgesproken in het Engels.
(Before Princess Laurentien started her speech a 1-minute video was
shown of "Ruud", a homeless man who has learned to read and write in
middle age.)
So Ruud went from being homeless to being the proud owner of a bicycle
store.... His own courage and determination brought him there. And
learning to read and write broke the negative cycle he was in. Ruud's
life story is one of the many faces and voices of the issues we´re
discussing....
People such as Ruud have taught me that literacy is about every aspect
of people's lives: about overcoming their shame and gaining
self-esteem, about finding and maintaining a job, being productive,
raising children, living healthily and yes, happily. Being able to
read and write enables us to know the law, understand our rights and
obligations as citizens. It is about having equal chances to a
fulfilling future. So investing in literacy is investing in someone's
self-confidence and self-esteem - which is crucial for getting ahead
in life. Illiteracy is much more than a lack of skills, the way that
poverty is about much more than a lack of income. Both are about
social deprivation, about feeling isolated and excluded and feeling
powerless about shaping one's life.
Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen,
I am truly delighted to be here with you. I would like to thank UNDP
and you, Mr Aboutaleb, for inviting me to this prestigious event. It
is wonderful to see so many representatives from municipalities - and
it is particularly heartening to have M. Jean-Yves Jason Muscadin,
Mayor of Port-au-Prince, in our midst. It is a great opportunity to
meet so many distinguished experts from a range of disciplines. And I
must admit, preparing for today was an enjoyable intellectual
challenge, as there are so many ways of looking at the link between
poverty and illiteracy. It is easy to get carried away - I'm sure you
know the feeling... Since I fully appreciate that you're much more
knowledgeable about all of these issues, I'd like to simply share some
personal observations with you - having worked on literacy issues in
the Netherlands for nearly a decade and more recently also
internationally as Unesco's Special Envoy on Literacy for Development.
Two main points:
1. Illiteracy is a global problem of great urgency, affecting
developed and developing nations alike.
2. Illiteracy must especially be tackled at local level, whereby the
interest of those affected, not simply predetermined policy
"boxes", should guide our approach.
There is no silver bullet in eradicating either illiteracy or poverty,
but there are lessons learned that will hopefully contribute to real
solutions.
First, illiteracy is a global problem.
Many of the traditional geographic divides in this world are no longer
valid. Issues transcend boundaries. Climate change is an obvious one.
But also take the role of knowledge and digital information and
communication. They rule our systems, our decisions, our interaction.
North, south, east, west... people's success in their societies is
largely defined by their ability to absorb, grasp and actively use
information independently. Written information rules our lives as
consumers, voters, employees, patients....
Reading, writing and numeracy skills have thus become a prerequisite
to function fully and independently. And this individual situation
translates to society as a whole - how can we achieve our ambitions on
competitiveness, healthy living, sustainability, social inclusion and
active citizenship when large proportions of the population lack the
necessary skills to contribute to these ambitions?
Let´s turn to the numbers for a moment... they are shocking and speak
for themselves: 776 million people across the world are illiterate. 75
million children don´t have access to education. I realize that the
challenges of illiteracy play out differently in different countries.
But illiteracy, like poverty, is not an issue that only affects
countries in development, as is still too often believed. In Europe,
an average of 12 percent of adults are functionally illiterate and 80
million people are at risk of poverty. In the Netherlands, 1.5 million
adults are functionally illiterate - 1 million of whom are born and
bred in the Netherlands. And 25 percent of our children leave primary
school being two years behind in reading and writing. What does that
mean for their future in a society in which written information and
communication play such a crucial role?
I know from experience here in the Netherlands how hard it is for a
developed society to admit that staggering numbers of people cannot
read and write. Countries are ashamed to admit to failures not only of
educational systems, but also of informal societal structures such as
the family and communities. These structures are apparently not able
to detect illiteracy or stimulate children to learn how to read and
write.
If we want to tackle illiteracy across the globe as a route to tackle
poverty, countries traditionally labeled as 'developed' must also
face the uncomfortable reality about serious shortcomings in their
national levels of literacy. In this part of the world, the problem
may not be access to education. But we are faced with a decreasing
number and a debate about the quality of our teachers, with a lack of
reading and writing abilities of large numbers of children, employees
lacking the necessary literacy skills to handle production processes
when they become more computerized and citizens making the wrong
health decisions due to their limited literacy skills. When I speak
about literacy issues with representatives from governments, business
and civil society across the globe - from Nigeria to France, from
India to the US and from Brazil to the Netherlands, it strikes me time
and time again how similar some of the debates are. In our
traditionally so-called developed nations, it would probably serve us
better to be humble about our own literacy levels and about our own
risks of marginalizing great numbers of people. A sense of humility
will help us to address the issue structurally and may inspire us to
develop the mindset needed to tackle some of the issues head on.
People should be at the heart of our thinking
This brings me to my second point. International, national and
regional players of course have an important role in
awareness-raising, priority-setting and funding. But solutions on
illiteracy issues are best developed and implemented at local level,
close to people themselves.
What we call issues, are in fact conditions and situations affecting
someone's life / someone like Ruud whom you saw in the short clip at
the beginning. I know that the global problems we´re talking about are
matters of your daily concern. They are about children that come to
school without breakfast, the uninsured in your hospitals, the
homeless in your streets, and the families at your job centers looking
for work.
They all constantly come into contact with local authorities, schools,
businesses or aid agencies.... We should view them as opportunities to
help improve skills, address their financial issues, promote healthy
living and stimulate active citizenship. It is up to us to connect the
dots and let go of sometimes artificial divides of policy areas. By
putting people at the centre of our thinking and acting smartly across
policy areas, we may increase our chances to truly tackling a problem.
Looking at it this way, issues stop competing with each other as they
all become part of the same 'chain'.
This European Year for Combating Poverty and Social Exclusion is
promising from this people-centric perspective. It aims to "give a
voice to the concerns of people who have to live with poverty and
social exclusion", wants to "challenge stereotypes and collective
perceptions of poverty" and is a "call to tackle the causes of poverty
head-on". I so hope that we put this commendable perspective into
practice!
A lot of people with financial problems lack the necessary basic
skills they actually need to function and get out of their problems,
let alone get ahead. Stimulating people to improve their skills is
often a crucial step to improve their condition and thus the first
step to build a more inclusive society. And literacy lies at the heart
of it.
This is an important gathering that I am delighted to be part of. But
I must admit that I cannot help thinking: when will we have the last
conference of this kind? What would be the one thing we all know
should be changed to make real progress? In response, you will rightly
tell me that it´s not as simple as that.... You will no doubt tell me
that issues are complex and that solutions are not so easy to be
found. You´re right - but we must make progress. And assuming that we
want to change something, we should dare to admit that change cannot
happen with the same mindset as the one that helped create what we
wish to change...
Don´t you feel that we´re at a crossroads in time, shaped by the
global financial crisis, the state of play of our environment and our
scarce resources? These challenges are of such magnitude that we are
obviously overwhelmed by them. But we can also use them as
opportunities to affect a change in mindset. What we do know, is that
we need each other to tackling these issues. Also, when it comes to
literacy and education more generally, for instance, in many instances
we don't need to reinvent the wheel. We need to connect and share what
we already know and in doing so, reach out to new and seemingly
unexpected players. And let´s make sure that we don´t spend too much
time preaching to the converted....
I conclude....
Over the next few days, you will develop a "Rotterdam Call to Action".
Knowing the spirit of this city, I´m convinced it will be
action-oriented and ambitious. But at least as important as the
commitments themselves is a robust agreement on how to implement what
you agreed to and how to check that you actually did. My humble advice
is to stick to what you agreed to before you move on to something
else. Even when something is urgent, patience is a virtue. And we
should certainly try for issues to remain priorities, regardless the
political contexts.
As we all know, there is no silver bullet in tackling complex issues
such as poverty, social exclusion or illiteracy... Every one of us
working in different contexts, face different as well as similar
challenges. Our individual and collective success will be defined by
admitting to shortcomings, putting into practice what we know,
celebrate successes, build on them and replicate them elsewhere. The
ultimate aim is of course to scale up the impact of our actions. We
are individually and collectively responsible and let us not forget
that there´s no leadership without learning...
I wish you every success in your important work. Thank you.
* © RVD