Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) is a Right and a Public Good: From Commitment to Action
June 23, 2025
In 2022, governments, multilateral organizations, and civil society met in Tashkent to reaffirm what we already know but still fail to realize: early childhood care and education (ECCE) is not a luxury, a market commodity, or a charitable service—it is a fundamental human right and a public good that must be guaranteed for all. The Global Report on Early Childhood Care and Education: The Right to a Strong Foundation (UNESCO-UNICEF, 2024) lays bare the continued inequities and underinvestment in ECCE and serves as a wake-up call to finally transform promises into policies.
In line with the Tashkent Declaration, this article underscores three central commitments that demand urgent implementation:
Ensuring universal access to quality ECCE
Investing at least 10% of education budgets in the sector
Transforming governance to overcome fragmentation and ensure strong regulation of non-state actors
These are not aspirational goals. They are necessary obligations to uphold the right to education from the very beginning of life.
1. Guaranteeing Access and Quality: A Matter of Rights, Not Charity
Despite overwhelming evidence of ECCE’s importance for foundational learning and lifelong well-being, nearly 60% of children in low-income countries are still deprived of any form of organized early learning. Access remains lowest for children living in poverty, those in rural or conflict-affected areas, and children with disabilities.
But access alone is not enough. Quality remains elusive. Only 57% of pre-primary teachers in low-income countries have the minimum required pedagogical training, and pupil-trained teacher ratios exceed 50:1 in some regions. These disparities are exacerbated when ECCE systems rely heavily on unregulated non-state provision.
The growth of non-state actors in ECCE is a global reality, filling gaps left by underfunded public systems. However, this has led to fragmented service delivery, variable quality, and increased inequality. In many contexts, market-driven ECCE provision prioritizes profitability over equity, leaving vulnerable families with few or poor-quality options.
The Tashkent Declaration is clear: States must regulate non-state actors, ensuring that all ECCE providers—whether public or private—meet standards for equity, accessibility, pedagogical quality, and child rights protections. This requires robust legal frameworks and strong monitoring mechanisms, not just laissez-faire encouragement of "choice" in early education markets.
ECCE is not a consumer good. It is a right. Guaranteeing this right means building strong, universal public systems while strictly regulating the growing private sector to prevent exclusion and abuse.
2. Financing the Future: 10% Is the Minimum, Not the Ceiling
As highlighted in the Global Report, achieving one year of universal pre-primary education in 79 low- and lower-middle-income countries will require an average of USD 44 billion annually—with an annual financing gap of USD 21 billion. Yet, many governments allocate far below the recommended 10% of education budgets to ECCE.
At Tashkent, states committed to this 10% target. But without binding frameworks and political will, most countries remain far from this goal.
Into this vacuum has entered a seductive—but problematic—discourse on “innovative financing.” Mechanisms such as social impact bonds, outcomes-based financing, and public-private partnerships are being promoted as solutions to the financing gap.
But these “innovative” tools often come with high transaction costs, limited accountability, and a logic driven by investor return, not children’s rights. They can deepen dependence on private capital markets and distort policy priorities toward measurable outcomes over holistic development.
As the Global Report warns, innovative financing should never substitute for public investment. Nor should it become a backdoor for expanding private control over essential services. Instead, progressive domestic financing—through equitable taxation, anti-corruption measures, and reprioritization of public budgets—must be the foundation of ECCE funding.
Furthermore, international donors must meet their obligations. Currently, aid to pre-primary education is just 1.7% of total education aid. A serious increase in international solidarity, aligned with national plans and focused on equity, is urgently needed.
3. Governance and Regulation: Building Coherence and Accountability
ECCE governance remains one of the sector’s weakest links. In many countries, services are fragmented across ministries and sectors, lacking coordination and coherence. The result is inefficient service delivery, poor oversight, and missed opportunities to support children and families holistically.
The Tashkent Declaration calls for a whole-of-government, multisectoral, and integrated approach to ECCE. This means more than collaboration—it requires a rethinking of governance structures to ensure that all children’s rights are protected across education, health, nutrition, protection, and social services.
Crucially, this includes regulating the non-state sector, which in many countries has expanded rapidly with little oversight. Regulatory frameworks must ensure that all providers—public, private, NGO, or faith-based—meet national quality standards, respect children’s rights, and are integrated into national monitoring and accountability systems.
ECCE governance transformation also means anchoring ECCE within legal frameworks. As the Global Report argues, the absence of an explicit legal right to ECCE in many countries undermines accountability. We need a new international legal instrument to recognize ECCE as an enforceable human right.
A Final Word: From Promise to Political Will
The 2024 Global Report on ECCE is both a diagnostic and a call to action. It shows where we stand and what must change. But reports do not transform systems—political will does.
The Tashkent commitments are a roadmap. But they must be backed by action: public investment, public provision, and public regulation. ECCE must be de-commodified and placed where it belongs—as a right, a public good, and a pillar of just and sustainable societies.
With less than five years to achieve SDG 4.2, the time to act is now. The cost of inaction is not only borne by children, but also a cost to equity, peace, democracy, and the future we claim to build.
References
UNESCO & UNICEF. (2024). Global Report on Early Childhood Care and Education: The Right to a Strong Foundation. Paris & New York. https://doi.org/10.54675/FWQA2113
UNESCO. (2022). Tashkent Declaration and Commitments to Action for Transforming Early Childhood Care and Education. https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000382067
Author
Mercedes MAYOL LASSALLE is the World President of OMEP - World Organization for Early Childhood Education, since 2020. She is a member of the Board of the Global Campaign for Education (GCE). She is currently a member of the Coordination Group of the UNESCO Collective Consultation of NGOs on Education 2030 and of the UNESCO Technical Advisory Group for the follow-up of the Tashkent Declaration and Commitments to Action for Transforming Early Childhood Care and Education.
