Early Child Development (ECD) Is Key in Determining the positive livelihood of the community
Early childhood development (ECD) is critical for an individual’s ability to live a full and productive life, as well as a country’s progress. When money is invested in mothers and young children, the danger of dying before they reach the age of five is reduced; they also have a better chance of succeeding in school and breaking the poverty cycle.
Only ten percent of Ugandan children aged three to five are enrolled in formal pre-primary education. The majority of preschools are privately owned and operated and are concentrated in urban areas. Community-based ECD centres receive little government funding, are under-equipped, often lack basic essentials such as clean water and toilets, and are administered by untrained volunteers (www.unicef.org/uganda).
In addition, young children are denied access to critical social services in their communities. Uganda has one of the lowest immunisation rates in East Africa, with one out of every four births occurring outside of a health facility and 30% of children under the age of five lacking access to safe drinking water. As a result, infant and maternal death rates continue to be high, and malnutrition is common. Hundreds of thousands of children are also not registered at birth, which prevents them from obtaining services and deprives them of an official identity.
Our aproach
TOUCEO is seeking help increase access to, and coverage of, integrated community-based ECD services that meet national standards and benefit the most disadvantaged children. This means helping the government to develop ECD policies and strategies, coordinate interventions, promote community-based services, train service providers and improve parenting skills.
TOUCEO aims to help scale up highly successful child nutrition interventions such exclusive breastfeeding, supplementing, deworming, and treatment of severe acute malnutrition, with an emphasis on the first 1,000 days of a child’s life.