Over the past five years the realized costs on education have dropped by over 40 percent, and even the low amounts are underfinanced. This was stated by OPPOSITION PLATFORM — FOR LIFE MP Serhiy Lovochkin on the eve of the new academic year in schools and colleges.

“Financing of the education sector has been in crisis over the most recent five years. While in 2013 education expenses reached the equivalent of $13.2bln, or 7.2 percent of GDP, in 2019 the amount budgeted is $9.1bln, or 6 percent of GDP. The lost percentage point is the reason behind cuts in the number of schools and teachers,” Lovochkin said.

The politician noted that the “Education” item in the consolidated budget has been significantly underfinanced over the most recent years. In 2016, it hadn’t received 9.8bln hryvnia (7.1 percent of the entire amount of expenses), in 2017 — 14.2bln hryvnia (7.4 percent), in 2018 — 13.8bln hryvnia (6.2 percent). The trend continues well into this year: over the first six months of 2019, the general fund of the state budget underfinanced education by 14 percent.

“First of all, insufficient funds are allocated for subventions to the regions, which forces local governments to cut the number of teachers. For the same reason, the number of technical and vocational schools, as well as out-of-school teaching facilities, has been reduced drastically. Ukrainian schools are entering the new academic year with the same problems. They will not develop if the state cuts corner this way. Revision of budget funding for education is the only way to get it out of the crisis,” Lovochkin said.