The IDB and Its Partners Launch the Early Childhood Development Hub

The Hub is the first website that consolidates into a single location and facilitates access to resources and knowledge about early childhood produced throughout the region.  This collective learning initiative is being driven by the Early Childhood Development Innovation Fund, an alliance of the IDB, FEMSA Foundation, Maria Cecilia Souto Vidigal Foundation, Open Society Foundations, and Porticus.

The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), together with its partners in the Early Childhood Development Innovation Fund, has launched the Early Childhood Development Hub: Knowledge and Innovation for Latin America and the Caribbean. The Hub is a website that promotes the exchange of learning, shows the world the wealth of knowledge produced in the region, and offers practical resources and tools to implement actions to support the development of children up to 5 years old. The initiative targets governments, national and international organizations, the private sector, civil society, students, families, and all others interested in understanding and learning about early childhood development in the region. 

Available in Spanish English, and Portuguese, the Hub presents a wide variety of resources, including an interactive map of innovative childhood development programs in the region with a description of each one and links to additional related information. In addition, the Hub facilitates access to multiple resources produced by different organizations that operate in the region, including publications, blogs, intervention materials, studies that measure childhood development and the quality of services, events, and webinars, among others.  

The Early Childhood Development Hub is being launched at a critical moment for early childhood. Due to COVID-19, many early childhood services have been suspended throughout the region and nearly 19 million preschool-age children are not in school. This has prompted an urgent need to create opportunities to exchange ideas and insights in order to re-think, create, and articulate quality services that are flexible and resilient – that is, services that ensure continuity in the development and learning of the youngest children, especially those from households most affected by the economic crisis that has resulted from the pandemic. 

Evidence shows that quality childhood development services are the best guarantee of a good start in life for all children born in Latin America and the Caribbean. Available data for the region document that there are gaps in development levels from an early age between children raised in households with different levels of socioeconomic status. These gaps persist and widen with age, and when children begin schooling, they result in significant differences in learning processes. It is imperative to look for mechanisms to ensure that the more than 50 million children from 0 to 5 years old in the region, and particularly those from vulnerable households, have the opportunity to develop their potential during their first years of life through experiences that are significant and rich in terms of quality interventions in the home, daycare centers, and preschools.

To achieve this, governments have recognized the importance of investing in early childhood. However, work remains to be done to achieve quality services on a large scale through the generation of knowledge, coordination among sectors, strengthening of networks, and creativity in the design of innovative and cost-effective programs. The Knowledge Hub for Early Childhood Development is a unique effort focused on supporting this effort through collective learning at the regional level.

We invite you to explore the initiative at http://desarrollo-infantil.iadb.org/