Opinion: Brazil is showing leadership on supporting early childhood – it’s time for others to follow

Opinion: Brazil is showing leadership on supporting early childhood – it’s time for others to follow


Mariana Luz is CEO of the Maria Cecilia Souto Vidigal Foundation, and was formerly President of Embraer Foundation in the US and the Embraer Institute in Brazil. She has worked as a Professor of International Relations at different universities in Brazil. In 2015, she was appointed by the World Economic Forum a Young Global Leader. Justin van Fleet is the president of global children’s charity Theirworld and CEO of the Global Business Coalition for Education. He previously served as the director of the International Commission on Financing Global Education Opportunity and chief of staff to the United Nations Special Envoy for Global Education, former U.K. prime minister Gordon Brown.

The world is losing the very battle it declared against poverty and inequality when the Sustainable Development Goals were agreed in 2015.

With just six years remaining to achieve the SDGs, the gap between rich and poor is widening, with the first increase in extreme poverty and inequality in more than two decades recorded in 2022. Very often, it is children who bear the brunt of inequality, with enduringly high numbers – an estimated 333 million – living in extreme poverty.

In a variety of agreements and commitments, world leaders have previously acknowledged the importance of quality early childhood development to levelling the playing field for the world’s children.

It is easy to see why: there is substantial evidence that investing in the early years is one of the most cost-effective strategies for poverty alleviation, reducing inequality and boosting economic productivity. It is also recognized as fiscally smart, given the multiplier effect across numerous the SDGs.

Yet many governments around the world are failing to invest in the support every parent and caregiver needs to ensure their children get the best start in life. There are at least 175 million children are not enrolled in preschool programmes.

This lack of basic provision has a strong ripple effect. The poorest and most marginalized families struggle to make ends meet, women are disproportionately unable to stay in the workforce, and children miss out on positive early years care and support that will support them to thrive in life.

Encouragingly, there are now signs that world leaders are realising they must raise their game when it comes to the early years. We are particularly pleased that Brazil, as a leading emerging economy and the current president of the G20, is among those at the forefront of the required radical change of direction.

President Lula da Silva in July called on world leaders to join forces in a Global Alliance Against Hunger and Poverty, which he aims to officially launch at the G20 Summit in Rio de Janeiro in November. For those of us dedicated to improving early childhood, it was especially heartening to see his statement on the Global Alliance recognise the need for support to tackle inequality, especially through access to social security support for parents and families.

Moreover, Brazil’s Minister of Social Development, Wellington Dias, emphasised during remarks made at the UN General Assembly last month that the new alliance will prioritise early childhood.

Brazil is also setting an important example by establishing its own new national policy on early childhood development. The policy aims to provide comprehensive support for young children and their families, ensuring access to quality childcare, education, protection and health services.

Importantly, in a vast country with great differences in wealth, infrastructure, geography and culture, the policy is being designed after close consultation with the states, cities and local governments, civil society and children themselves, because without engagement and buy-in from every level of government, good quality implementation of a national policy won’t happen.

By prioritizing the early years, Brazil is demonstrating a national commitment to breaking the cycle of poverty and inequality at its roots but providing an example to other developing economies.

It is now time for other world leaders to follow President Lula and not only recognise the transformative power of investing in the early years, but to move from promises to action, and turn commitments into tangible investments. The G20 meeting in November would be a great place to start.

A new report by Theirworld shows just how effective investment early childhood could be. It shows that if Brazil had invested an additional 1.2% of GDP into universal benefits for parents after 2018, then 8.5 million children could have been lifted out of poverty in just two years.

Across the whole of the G20 increasing universal childcare spending by just 0.4% of GDP could have brought 67 million more women into the workforce across the G20 in the three years after the 2018 G20 Initiative on Early Childhood Development.

That initiative was a landmark commitment which, unfortunately, has remained just that – a commitment, floating around in the realm of policy make-belief.

To turn policy into reality, political leaders and donors must start viewing supporting our youngest children not as a cost but as the best possible of all investments.

There are now more than 150 early-years focussed organisations, including Maria Cecilia Souto Vidigal Foundation and others in Brazil, alongside UNICEF, UNESCO, Lego Foundation, Sesame Workshop, Theirworld and many more, who are backing the Act For Early Years campaign, which is calling for at least $1 billion in new funding commitments to early childhood by 2028 and for the staging of the first-ever International Financing Summit on Early Years to secure those investments.

This is not just a moral imperative; it is a smart economic strategy that benefits everyone—governments, businesses, communities, parents, caregivers, and most importantly, young children.

This vision aligns with Brazil’s ambition for the G20 and its new national policy. It will finally tackle the root causes of complex challenges that world leaders vowed to challenge nine years ago but have yet truly to confront.

 



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