Ciarán Cuffe (Dún Laoghaire, Green Party)
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Question 494: To ask the Minister for Education and Science if he will ratify the Convention on Technical and Vocational Education 1989; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [35471/09]

Batt O'Keeffe (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)
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Ireland has not ratified the UNESCO 1989 Convention on Technical and Vocational Education, and has no plans to do so. There are only 17 parties to the Convention to date, out of 193 UNESCO Member States, mostly in the Middle East, Eastern Europe, Asia and Africa. Only two EU Member States, Bulgaria and Lithuania, have ratified the Convention and this occurred in the early 1990s, prior to their accession to the European Union.

Notwithstanding the above, Ireland is committed to common approaches to quality in vocational education and training and higher education under the Copenhagen and Bologna processes. Through its membership of the EU, and with the support of the European Structural Funds, Ireland has expanded its vocational education and training system, and has developed a single unified national framework of qualifications which covers all awards in the State, across the education and training sectors. Ireland was the first country in the EU to reference its National Framework of Qualifications to the European Qualifications Framework and will progressively implement two further European Recommendations aimed at facilitating mobility and improving quality in vocational education and training across Europe, adopted in June 2009.

With regard to co-operation with developing countries, Irish Aid promotes international volunteering by Irish professionals and also supports a programme of Strategic Co-operation between Higher Education and Research Institutes designed to promote capacity building in developing countries to strengthen the delivery and evaluation of their education systems. Through this programme Irish higher education institutions are co-operating with developing countries to enhance teacher education, strengthen research and governance capacity, improve health research, provide optometric training, address climate change, poverty, and the management of water resources.