Egypt’s southernmost city, Aswan, some 700km south of Cairo, has won the 2019 UNESCO Learning City Award. The announcement was proudly made last week by Aswan Governor, Ahmed Ibrahim, who thanked and congratulated Aswan’s people for that achievement. “This confirms the international rank of Aswan which has been selected the capital of African youth, and is a centre for convergence of cultures and arts on the touristic, economic, scientific, cultural and heritage levels,” the Governor said.
Aswan was one of the ten winning cities from among 159 contestants around the world that had competed for the 2019 UNESCO Learning City Award. The UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning (UIL) announced that the ten winning cities of the 2019 UNESCO Learning City Award were: Aswan (Egypt), Chengdu (China), Heraklion (Greece), Ibadan (Nigeria), Medellín (Colombia), Melitopol (Ukraine), Petaling Jaya (Malaysia), Santiago (Mexico), Seodaemun-gu (Republic of Korea), and Sønderborg (Denmark). According to the Learning City Award Jury, these cities have shown exemplary progress and commitment to promote education and lifelong learning at the local level.
Aswan, it said, has developed a strategy that integrates a variety of projects, including gardening and water-conservation programmes in schools, as well as diverse entrepreneurial training opportunities for all groups of society.
The awards will be presented at the 2019 International Conference on Learning Cities in Medellín later this year.
Watani International
7 February 2019