Announcement of Five Million Three Hundred Thousand US Dollars Loan to Zambia for Education on November 19, 1969

• 1818 H STREET, N.W .. WASHINGTON D. C. 20433 TELEPHONE: EXECUTIVE 3-6360 Bank Press Release No. 69/69 Subject: $5.3 Uillion Loan to Zambia for November 19, 1969 Education An education project designed to help meet Zambia's critical need for more engineers and secondary school teachers will be carried out with the assistance of a $5. 3 million loan from the World Bank. The funds will be used for new buildings and additional equipment for the Schools of Education and of Engineering at the University of Zambia and the provision of student hostels to accommodate part of the steadily increasing enrollment. The loan will be made to the Republic of Zambia for a term of 25 years, in- • cluding a 10-ye,ir period of graGe, with interest at 7% • With a crucial shortage of high-level manpower, Zambia is heavily dependent on expatriates. This is costly, is accompanied by a comparatively high rate of turn- over, and a large number of posts remain unfilled. The University of Zambia was established in 1965 as a principal means of overcoming this problem, and now has eight Schools and two Departments and an enrollmen~ of about 1,000. Lack of qualified secondary school leavers has limited enrollment at the University. This situation is now changing and secondary school graduates are expected to increase fivefold in the next decade, partly as a result of a program being ass.isted by a $17 .4 million World Bank loan which, among other things, will add 35,700 new secondary s~udent places. Enrollments at the University are expected to reach 3,400 in 1973 and 5,000 in the late 1970s. Plans for expanding the U;;;.iversity are closely geared to meeting the country's specific manpower requirements. Highest priority is • being given to the sciences -- including agriculture, mediccine and engineering to education. and (more)  • Ba.9lk P.R. No. 69/69 - Zambia, Education- 2 - The project being assisted by the Bank loan will enable the School of Engineering and the School of Education to reach their 1973 enrollment targets. The School of Engineering, with about 360 students in 1973, will produce 80 engineers annually. The School of Education, with a full-time student equivalent enrollment of 6 70 by 1973, will train secondary school teachers and primary and secondary school principals. At the School of Engineering fmids will be used to finance the addition of two lecture rooms, 10 laboratories, 8 seminar rooms and 33 staff offices. The Govem- . ment plans to revise the curricula and detailed syllabi of the School of Engineering within the next year in order to relate them more directly to the industrial aspects of engineering. The School of Education will be provided with.a lecture theater, a language laboratory, an educational television studio, 10 special teaching spaces, 6 seminar rooms and 30 staff offices. The majority of students at the University require residential accoanodation because only a small proportion come from Lusaka where the University is situated, and suitable acc0111Dodation in the city is very scarce. The project, therefore, also includes the construction and furnishing of hostels to accommodate 960 additional students and staff. ral Organization (Unesco) The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultu1 assisted the Govemnient of Zambia in the preparation of the project. The Government. ~ill estab.lish within the University a Project Unit responsible • for carrying out the project and will employ architects to midertake the necessary architectural and engi·neering servic•s. The total cost is estimated at the equiv- alent of $7.4 million. The Bank loan of $5.3 million will finance the estimated foreign exchange component and the Government will finance th, local currency requirements. II I # •