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Dubai Cares

Dubai Cares takes part at World Conference on Early Childhood Care and Education 2022

Dubai Cares, a civil society organisation formally associated with the United Nations Department of Global Communications, recently participated in the World Conference on Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) held in Tashkent, Uzbekistan from 14-16 November 2022.

Hosted by UNESCO and hosted by the Republic of Uzbekistan, the World Conference on ECCE aims to reaffirm the right of all children to quality early childhood care and education, reaffirming the commitment and investment in achieving Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4.2, which calls for ensuring that “all girls and boys have access to quality early childhood development (ECD), care and pre-school education so that they are ready for primary education”.

The UAE-based global charity’s participation in the World Conference on ECCE stems from its long-standing commitment to promoting ECCE as one of the most important aspects of holistic child development. Since its inception in 2007, the organisation has been a strong global advocate for quality ECEC and has invested in a range of ECEC and ECCE-related activities and research to promote and facilitate the provision of quality, evidence-based services for young children and their caregivers to support children’s learning and school readiness.

To date, Dubai Cares has supported ECD and ECCE programmes in 16 countries, positively impacting the lives of over 4.5 million beneficiaries, with a total investment of AED 155,362,648 (USD 42,292,813). The organisation has successfully implemented these programmes in Afghanistan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Comoros, Gambia, India, Jordan, Kiribati, Laos, Malawi, Pakistan, Palestine, Peru, Rwanda, Sri Lanka, Tanzania and Vanuatu.

Dubai Cares has participated in a number of high-level meetings and gatherings to highlight its ongoing efforts to promote ECD. The Dubai Declaration on Early Childhood Development, adopted by Dubai Cares in partnership with UNICEF and the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation (MOFAIC) at the 2019 World Government Summit in Dubai, served as one of the building blocks of the Tashkent Declaration on Early Childhood Care and Education. Presented on the last day of the event, the Tashkent Declaration on ECCE provides guiding principles and strategies for transforming ECCE by: delivering equitable and inclusive quality ECCE services to all, strengthening the ECCE workforce and expanding support for caregivers, stimulating innovation to drive change and implementing effective and inclusive policy, governance and financing.

“The World Conference on Early Childhood Care and Education represents a historic moment in the mobilization of collective global efforts to promote ECCE, which is one of the most important aspects of healthy growth and development of children. The Dubai Declaration on Early Childhood Development, serving as one of the building blocks of the Tashkent Declaration on ECCE, is a clear reflection of the UAE and Dubai Cares’ commitment to continuously invest in ECCE and ECCE as one of the most effective ways to raise a strong generation with the right early care and education,” said H.E. Dr Tariq Al Gurg, Chief Executive Officer and Vice Chairman of Dubai Cares.

He also highlighted that the first win-win solution proposed in the “Rewiring Education for People and Planet” report, which Dubai Cares recently presented at the Transforming Education Summit at the 77th UN General Assembly in New York, calls for the expansion of early childhood programmes to end poverty, given that quality ECD programmes have the potential to increase individual adult income by almost 25%.

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