02389cas a2200241 a 4500 AALejournalIMF020886 230101c9999 xx r poo 0 0eng d 5.00 USD 9781513541310 1934-7685 BD-DhAAL BD-DhAAL International Monetary Fund. African Dept. Sierra Leone : Selected Issues. Washington, D.C. : International Monetary Fund, 2020. 1 online resource (40 pages) IMF Staff Country Reports <strong>Off-Campus Access:</strong> No User ID or Password Required <strong>On-Campus Access:</strong> No User ID or Password Required Electronic access restricted to authorized BRAC University faculty, staff and students This Selected Issues paper on Sierra Leone shows that boosting education and its quality for all children yields substantial macroeconomic gains. While investments in the sector will take time to yield results, the potential gains provide ample motivation for sustained, multi-pronged policy interventions along the lines highlighted in the following paragraphs. Equalizing access to education emerges as a critical goal for prosperity that is shared fairly across the population. Attaining free secondary education for all is a critical long-run objective. With limited fiscal space and vast challenges in the sector, evidence-based prioritizing, sequencing and targeting of policies is critical. Careful monitoring of education spending and its impacts will help reassess programs and priorities going forward. Enhancing the governance of the sector to ensure that spending is well-aligned with needs in the various levels is also important. Tackling the education challenge will require coordinated work to overcome hurdles in several sectors. Several factors currently within and beyond the education sector constrain efforts that could effectively reap the economic benefits from education. The results indicate the macroeconomic benefits of education could be substantial, in the order of up to 40 percent of gross domestic product in the long run. Mode of access: Internet IMF Staff Country Reports; Country Report ; No. 2020/117 Full text available on IMF http://elibrary.imf.org/view/journals/002/2020/117/002.2020.issue-117-en.xml IMF e-Library