Mozambique: New measures needed to tackle education crisis

Despite years of interventions designed to turn around Mozambique's historically poor education system, the 2006 school year has kicked off to a dismal start, sparking debate about proposed plans to solve the countries chronic teacher shortages. According to Naima Saú, Deputy Director of Teacher Training at the Ministry of Education, teacher-pupil ratios were a major cause for concern: "on average, there are 50 pupils in each class, and some teachers even have as many as 70 pupils in a class".