Today we celebrate International Literacy Day 2005. It is a day for recognizing the achievement of large numbers of men and women around the globe who have newly gained access to communication through the written word.

We congratulate them and applaud all those - literacy tutors, extension workers, teachers, community groups, friends, neighbours and family members - whose supportive efforts have been indispensable. International Literacy Day, however, is not an occasion for complacency. When there are approximately 800 million illiterate adults, when two-thirds of the world´s illiterate adults are women, and when over 100 million school-age children never attend school, we can be in no doubt that much remains to be done.

The scale and character of the global literacy challenge, furthermore, are greater than these statistics indicate, for two main reasons. First, it is evident that large numbers of children emerge from processes of primary education without a secure command of essential literacy competencies. Many developed countries, despite their highly organized and well-resourced education systems, are finding that a significant proportion of children have a limited grasp of core literacy skills. With far fewer resources and facing enormous problems of poverty, exclusion and marginalization, many developing countries are finding it difficult to staunch the flow of children who leave school barely able to read and write. Within a few years, many of these children will join the hidden ranks of the functionally illiterate.

Second, the limited availability of concrete opportunities for adults to acquire, maintain and improve their literacy skills and learning capacities means that hundreds of millions of people, especially women, are condemned to a lifetime of illiteracy. In the twenty-first century, such a situation is unconscionable.

It is to address both of these challenges, which are related to each other and linked to other educational and development problems, that the drive to achieve Education for All (EFA) has been mounted. Closely associated with EFA is the United Nations Literacy Decade (2003-2012), led and coordinated by UNESCO, which aims at mobilizing greater national and international efforts to achieve the Dakar goal of reducing illiteracy rates by half by 2015.

This year, International Literacy Day is devoted to the role of literacy in sustainable development. This is especially fitting since 2005 has seen the launch of the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (2005-2014), for which UNESCO is the lead agency and international coordinator.

As the foundation of all subsequent education, training and learning, literacy is essential for sustainable human development in today´s complex and fast-changing societies. In such societies, rudimentary literacy skills are not enough for effective communication and participation. In addition, literacy itself is acquiring new dimensions in response to technological and cultural change.

Consequently, literacy capacities need to be supplemented and updated so that individuals can deal with changing conditions and new uncertainties with confidence. The sustainability of literacy demands such adaptation.

The fulcrum of the relationship between literacy and sustainable development is citizenship, understood not as a formal entitlement but as the active, creative and dynamic activity of people as they shape and re-shape their lives. In this perspective, literacy is a precondition of effective social participation and a tool of empowerment at individual and community levels. A flexible set of literacy-based capabilities is essential for meeting the challenge of sustainable development.

How we learn to adapt will determine our welfare and security, and perhaps our very survival.

Literacy programmes are useful and effective vehicles for transmitting ideas and information pertinent to education for sustainable development (ESD). In some cases, such as literacy projects linked to income generation or sustainable livelihoods, a close synthesis is possible. Meanwhile, the orientation of literacy programmes towards empowerment, inclusion and local relevance, is likely to be a powerful influence on ESD approaches, especially in non-formal settings.

On International Literacy Day 2005, I call upon governments, international organizations, civil society and the private sector to give renewed attention and support to literacy as a vital instrument for achieving sustainable development. In this month when the world´s leaders will meet in New York to examine progress since the Millennium Declaration five years ago, it is timely to recall that education in general and literacy in particular are vital means for achieving sustainability, which is rooted in human capacities and their development.

Koïchiro Matsuura