Not less than 10 million Nigerian children are currently not captured in early childhood care, development and education (ECCDE), the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) has revealed.
UBEC warned that the low participation in early childhood education was contributing to poor learning outcomes and developmental challenges among children across the country.
Executive Secretary of UBEC, Dr Aisha Garba, disclosed this in Abuja at a three-day capacity-building workshop for state actors on the utilisation of the ECCDE Minimum Standards, Implementation Guidelines and UNICEF Parental and Community Engagement documents.
Garba, who was represented by the Deputy Executive Secretary (Technical), Rasaq Olajuwon Akinyemi, said only 35.6 per cent of Nigerian children aged 36 to 59 months currently attend any form of early childhood education.
She said analysis of the 2021 Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey also showed that about 46 per cent of children aged 24 to 59 months were developmentally off track.
According to her, the consequences of inadequate early childhood education become more pronounced as children progress through the education system.
‘Only 35.6 per cent of Nigerian children aged 36 to 59 months attend any form of early childhood education. That leaves roughly 10 million of our youngest children outside ECCDE altogether,’ she said.
Garba added that about 70 per cent of Nigerian 10-year-olds could not read and understand a simple text, while only about 2.4 million of the 5.9 million children who enter primary school each year remain in the education system at the end of junior secondary school.
She therefore called for early childhood development to be treated as an integrated national priority rather than a stand-alone education programme.
‘There is no cheaper place in the education system to buy results,’ Garba said, citing Nobel Laureate James Heckman’s estimate of about 13 per cent annual return per child on high-quality birth-to-five programmes.
The UBEC boss urged states to ensure that ECCDE interventions were captured in their State Matching Grant Action Plans, warning that programmes not included in the plans would not receive funding, procurement or monitoring attention.
‘I must be blunt: what is not in the Action Plan will not be funded, will not be procured and will not be monitored,’ she said.
Garba also disclosed that the deadline for states to submit their ECCDE Action Plans for the next intervention year had been extended from September 30 to October 5, 2026.
She, however, stressed that the extension was not an opportunity for further delay, adding that plans submitted after the new deadline would not be considered for the intervention year.
‘The extension is not an invitation to be delayed.
‘I expect every State to leave Abuja with a costed, integrated and inclusive draft plan, to present it to your Executive Chairman on your return, and to submit the final plan through the digital planning template within the extended period. Plans received after that date will not be considered for this intervention year,’ she added.
She further directed states to develop ECCDE programmes around the needs of the whole child by working with the health, nutrition, water and sanitation, women affairs, social welfare and Local Government Education Authorities.
Garba said the 2023-24 Nigeria Demographic and Health Survey put stunting among children under five at 40 per cent nationally, with the figure ranging from 12 per cent in Rivers State to 65 per cent in Katsina State.
She also urged states to ensure that ECCDE centres complied with essential standards covering child safety, supervision, safeguarding, food and water safety, structural safety and emergency exits.
The UBEC boss called for measures to ensure that children with disabilities and those living in hard-to-reach, nomadic, riverine and conflict-affected communities were not excluded from ECCDE programmes.
She also called for stronger engagement with parents, caregivers, School-Based Management Committees, traditional institutions and religious bodies, stressing that communities could serve as important delivery platforms for children who could not easily be reached through conventional classrooms.
Earlier, the Acting Director, Department of Special Programmes and Early Childhood, UBEC, Dr Chijioke J. Onwuzurike, said Nigeria currently had more than 45 early childhood development delivery channels across the health, nutrition, education, agriculture and social protection sectors.
She, however, said the multiplicity of channels had created fragmentation, with platforms sometimes duplicating one another, failing to share data and providing inconsistent services across communities.
Onwuzurike said the Commission expected every state, over the next 18 months, to map and streamline its existing early childhood development platforms.