International Literacy Day 2023: History, theme; celebrations, wishes this year

NEW DELHI: International Literacy Day (ILD) is being celebrated across the world today, September 8. The theme for ILD 2023 is, ‘Promoting literacy for a world in transition: Building the foundation for sustainable and peaceful societies’.

A conference will be organised both in person and online today in Paris, France. An award ceremony will be hosted to announce the UNESCO International Literacy Prizes 2023.

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The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in November 1966, during its 14th session declared September 8 as International Literacy Day “ to promote the importance of literacy as a matter of dignity and human rights, and to advance the literacy agenda towards a more literate and sustainable society.”

According to UNESCO, literacy progress has been hampered and inequalities have been increased across the world as of 2023. In low and middle-income countries, the share of 10-year-old children who are not able to read and understand a simple text has increased from 57 percent in 2019 to an estimated 70 percent in 2022 as per UNESCO.

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ILD 2023 aims to provide an opportunity to accelerate progress toward the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 4 (SDG4) on education and lifelong learning. As per the organisation, the ILD 2023 aims to focus on the role of literacy in building more inclusive, peaceful, just, and sustainable societies.

An official statement from UNESCO read, “ Literacy is central to the creation of such societies, while progress in other areas of development contributes to generating interest and motivation of people to acquire, use, and further develop their literacy and numeracy skills.”

Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan in a social media post said, ”Literacy is the cornerstone of sustainable development. On #InternationalLiteracyDay, let us rededicate ourselves towards universalising basic literacy & numeracy skills as well as prioritising quality education for building more skillful, sustainable, empowered and prosperous societies."

Literacy is the cornerstone of sustainable development.

On #InternationalLiteracyDay , let us rededicate ourselves towards universalising basic literacy & numeracy skills as well as prioritising quality education for building more skilful, sustainable, empowered and prosperous… pic.twitter.com/l7utWOvkqp

— Dharmendra Pradhan (@dpradhanbjp) September 8, 2023