Literacy is the key to building a state where people have equal opportunities and access to a full and decent life, the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, said at the weekend.
He stressed that the Government was working on a "forward-looking strategy" to ensure that higher standards of literacy for all were promoted.
The Government, he said, was also committed to breaking the link between low literacy skills and unemployment, "a deadly trap that has caught several generations in some families".
Mr Ahern was speaking on Saturday at the launch of International Literacy Day at the Royal Hospital Kilmainham, Dublin, where he acknowledged that the Republic still had a long way to go to solve a problem which for too long was not properly identified.
Referring to an OECD report on literacy published in 1997 which showed a quarter of all the adult population in the State had limited literacy skills, the Taoiseach said it pointed to "the bruising impact" of literacy difficulties on a person's quality of life, making it hard to get jobs, to keep jobs, and to get access to services from public bodies.
He said that the Government immediately took steps to address the problem, and progress had been made in several areas. Since his taking office, he said, the number of people availing of the literacy tuition service had doubled to 10,000, a family learning centre had provided training for 24 tutors in Clare, a programme for travellers that integrates literacy with life skills had been developed in Kilkenny, and literacy programmes were transmitted over the radio on a pilot basis in Mayo and Tipperary.