Riedewhaan Allie
Cape Town - International research studies and findings on early childhood development (ECD) as a poverty reduction strategy for both developed and developing countries confirm that quality ECD programmes have lasting positive impacts on academic, as well as other social and economic outcomes for children (Engle et al, 2011).
Studies conducted by Unicef (2021) and the World Bank (2020, 2015) tracked trends in Latin America, Asia and eastern as well as southern Africa, and found that pre-school education has a positive effect on children’s ability to succeed in school and to further their qualifications, and to obtain higher wages in the labour market.
Pre-school services also appeared to reduce socio-economic inequalities, as children from less advantaged backgrounds benefit more than children from more advantaged backgrounds.
In the South African context, it is important for the government to significantly invest in ECD as a poverty reduction strategy.
This is important when more than 16 million people already receive government grants (Ashley-Cooper et al, 2019; Statistics SA, 2018).
Additionally, 11 million children are beneficiaries of child support grants, of which 5.3 million are under the age of 5 years.
Unfortunately, only about 1 million are benefiting from existing ECD services (Stats SA, 2018). It is therefore evident that the government has not given any significant attention to improving the situation of our youngest citizens.
Instead, the democratic government shifted from an RDP policy to Gear and Asgisa (Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative for SA) as the preferred macro-economic framework.
While the RDP was focused on increased social spending to address inequality, the new macro-economic policies were focused on the market, with a reduced role for the government in social spending.
The fiscal constraints due to the new economic policies and support for the market significantly affected government spending on social, education and health programmes, which negatively affected the implementation of quality ECD programmes.
The ECD sector also followed a market model in which ECD is provided through “markets”, with the parents and caregivers selecting the ECD service the family requires, from “suppliers in the marketplace”.
The recent ECD census report (2021), commissioned by the Department of Basic Education and funded by the Lego Foundation, found that 42 420 ECD sites were counted, which made provision for about 1.6 million children.
A significant finding was that there were about 6.2 ECD sites per 1 000 children.
In addition, the report reflects that only 33% of ECD sites are funded and subsidised by the government.
This underlines the strength of the dominant market model that demands caregivers and parents pay for services they can’t afford due to increasing poverty and unemployment.
In addition, the Thrive by Five (2022) report found a staggering 65% of children in ECD programmes fail to thrive by the age of 5 and are not on track for cognitive and physical development.
These children will require additional support as they transition into the formal school system in either Grade R or Grade 1.
The report also suggests that children not accessing ECD services in the poorest communities are falling far behind, and therefore efforts to address the barriers to accessing ECD services and programmes need to be strengthened between government and community partners, or we risk that these children will never be able to catch up with children from wealthier communities.
With all the hype and tension around the matric results, it is important that we acknowledge that every year more than 1 million children enter the formal school system, and only about 50% of them manage to sit for the matric exams.
It is evident that the school system is not doing enough to provide additional support to young children in the foundation phase, and that many struggle to stay in the system and eventually drop out to become a further drain on the welfare and social security system.
What is therefore needed is first to make ECD services and programmes more accessible. Moss (2009) argues that the preschool model of service provision is a “market model” that allows parents and service providers to view ECD as a commodity that can be purchased.
Therefore the ECD sector needs to consider a more democratic and community-developmental model.
While the market model is based on a relationship of trade between parents and preschool operators, the model of democratic experimentalism as argued by Moss (2009) is that ECD should not be considered a private commodity, but a public good, and a public responsibility.
This should encourage communities to take collective responsibility for the education and upbringing of their young children.
This would reduce individual choice and freedom of choice as promoted by the market model, while collective choice would promote the common good instead of the individual need.
The shift towards a democratic experimental model can be achieved when community-based ECD forums become inclusive of a wider pool of community stakeholders, instead of serving just as a platform for preschool operators or sellers of services.
Secondly, in line with the National Integrated ECD Policy (2015), the government should consider funding various ECD modalities such as home visiting, playgroups, and mobile and toy library services,that can be scaled to enable more young children to access services and programmes close to their homes.
Thirdly, based on the recent ECD census report that only 33% of ECD centres are funded, and that parents are paying an average of R509 a month for services, it can be argued that parents and, by implication, communities, are contributing more than R9 772 billion towards the ECD needs of their children and employment creation of nearly 200 000 ECD jobs in South Africa.
The government should therefore match this amount to support the growing ECD needs of our children, or run the risk that the goal to reduce income poverty and inequality will remain a distant dream.
Dr Allie is with the Foundation for Community Work in Athlone.
Cape Times