By Justin Irish D. Tabile, reporter
SEOUL – The president of the Korea Institute for Economic Cooperation said South Korea's success is based on investment in education “more than any other country.”
Byung Koo Cho, visiting senior fellow at the Korea Development Institute, said in a lecture at the Center for Global Knowledge and Development: “Education is important for any country. Even advanced European countries need education because the world changes, technology changes, so we need different people.”
“We can't say that the Korean education system is better than other countries, but we can say that Korea has invested more in education than any other country,” Mr. Cho said, noting that South Korea has consistently invested more than every other rich country.
The Education Ministry's 2025 budget proposal was set at 104.9 trillion won, equivalent to 15.6% of the budget, up from 9.8 trillion won in 2024, or 14.6% of all spending.
“On average, Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries spend about 10% of their government budgets on education,” he said.
Mr. Cho said that after being 80% illiterate in 1945, South Korean literacy is nearly 100%.
He said the main issue in South Korea is the large amount of funding for secondary education.
“We have to move this funding to tertiary education… it is very difficult to move that money… but we have to do it; we have to move funding from secondary to tertiary education, (which will lead to changes in educational systems),” he said.
The OECD notes that South Korea “spends $21,476 per student on primary to post-secondary non-tertiary education, the highest in the OECD.”
It adds, “However, public expenditure per tertiary student is a comparatively low $6,617, less than half the OECD average of $15,102.”
Mr Cho said the impact of education on the country's GDP will take time to become apparent.
“Along with investment in education, there have to be right strategies and proper jobs (to students) and that is the role of the government,” he said.
“Education, jobs and individual careers, and the national development path – we all have to think about it together. But education is important for everything,” he said.
According to George T. Barcelona, president of the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry, although the Philippines is committed by law to make education its highest spending priority, the impact of such investments is often diminished due to corruption.
He said, “There is a lot of corruption in this department. Corruption is also endemic in the history of our education system.” He said there is a need for improvement in policy and implementation.
In the General Appropriations Act 2025, the Department of Education received P782 billion out of the P6.326-trillion budget for the year.
Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation Chief Economist Michael L. “Education has always been the largest budget allocation for many years or decades,” Ricafort said via Viber.
However, he said education needs more investment from the private sector due to the limited financial scope of the government.
“An investment approach, given limited NG financial resources, will provide the greatest benefits to the economy in terms of faster economic growth and greater development, especially in rural areas,” he said.
He said investment in education could help maximize the productivity of the Philippine population, which is more than 114 million and 12th the world's.th The biggest.
“Education is the great equalizer. It will lift more people and their families out of poverty, especially the poorest of the poor,” he said.
However, he said investment in this sector should be coupled with spending on nutrition to ensure that students complete their education and do not drop out.
“STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) and other courses required for the job market both locally and globally should also be given priority,” he said.
