The WBG is supporting countries around the world by ensuring young children have the right nutrition, early stimulation and learning, as well as protection from stress that affects their development.
Examples include:
Senegal: The Senegal Investing in the Early Years for Human Development Project is a multisectoral project that will reach 2.5 million children and their parents through integrated community-based nutrition, early stimulation and parenting education programs; enroll more than 210,000 children into formal preschools, Koranic preschools and community-based early learning programs; construct 220 preschool classrooms; and increase access to birth registration from 46 percent to 60 percent.
Liberia: The Liberia Learning Foundations Project is financing construction of early childhood education classrooms, the provision of teaching and learning materials, and the scaling up of an accelerated learning program for overage students. The project includes Results-Based Financing through three Performance-Based Conditions focused on increasing equity, efficiency, and learning outcomes.
Burkina Faso: The Burkina Faso Education Access and Quality Improvement Project found a cost-effective way to expand access to ECE in remote areas and in times of conflict: Interactive Audio Instruction (IAI). The program is aligned with the national curriculum standards and the government will also use the IAI program to provide untrained teachers with continuous guidance and reinforcement, linked with a project-designed system of teacher certification, opening a cost-effective, practical option for teacher training in rural areas. Over the lifetime of EAQIP, 25,000 children will be newly enrolled in preschool and 600 teachers will receive training.
Sri Lanka: Though Sri Lanka has an estimated 17,000 early childhood development centers serving half a million children ages three to five, fewer than half meet basic national quality standards. The WBG is working with the Government to increase access to and quality of early childhood centers around the country, while providing teacher training, programs for parents, and tuition support for poor families.
Madagascar: In Madagascar, where more than 50 percent of children are stunted, the National Community Nutrition Program is now reaching 2.1 million mothers and children under five years of age, delivering growth-monitoring activities, cooking demonstrations, and nutrition education through a network of more than 7,000 sites. Political instability and natural disasters make the country’s children particularly vulnerable. As part of a pilot program, families are receiving additional visits from community health workers who teach parents about the importance of early childhood stimulation. The results thus far are encouraging and show that intensive counseling, combined with nutrient supplements, could be an important intervention in Madagascar.
Mongolia: The WBG has been working with the Government of Mongolia to build preschools, create mobile kindergartens for the country’s vast rural areas, and provide books and toys to boost kids’ learning. The project, which has already benefited some 8,500 of the country’s most remote children, also includes an innovative home-based program that targets nomadic parents and teaches them to engage with their children and play the role of preschool teacher several hours a week. Results are promising: participating children significantly outperformed comparable children enrolled in publicly-provided alternative early childhood programs.
Peru: In 2007, 28.5 percent of Peruvian 0-5 year old children suffered from chronic malnutrition. With support from the WBG and other donors, Peru strengthened its conditional cash transfers and the supply of health and nutrition services to target low-income families with young children. In just seven years, the country cut its chronic malnutrition rate in half, to 14 percent. This ranks among the most successful achievements in improving child nutrition in the world and underscores the ability to achieve dramatic and relatively quick improvements in child malnutrition.
Last Updated: Oct 25, 2021