Only 38% of Children Aged 3–5 Access Early Education-Experts
By Ojoma Akor
Experts have revealed that only about 38 percent of children aged three to five participate in early childhood education.
Dr. Ado Muhammad, Federal Coordinator, Human Capital Development, stated this during a consultation workshop of media and civil society organizations organized as part of the World Bank’s early childhood development technical mission in Abuja.
This compares with 36 percent in Kenya and 18 percent in Senegal. The figures form part of a broader picture of poor early childhood outcomes. Nigeria records an under-five mortality rate of 110 per 1,000 live births.
Represented by Dr Zainab Muhammad-Idris, National President of the Medical Women’s Association of Nigeria (MWAN), he said evidence shows the first five years of life are critical to a child’s cognitive, social, and emotional development. He identified early childhood development (ECD) as a critical human-capital issue requiring coordinated action across education, health, nutrition, social protection, water and sanitation, and other sectors.
ECD is the physical, cognitive, social, emotional, and language development of children from conception to age five—the first 2,000 days of life.
Dr Muhammad stated that 90 percent of adult brain architecture is formed by age five, yet only 47.7 percent of Nigerian children are on track on the Early Childhood Development Index (ECDI).
The learning gap begins before primary school.
He said that the challenges facing Nigerian children extend beyond access to formal schooling.
“Among children aged four to six, only 24 percent can write a simple word, while 64 percent can count from one to 10 and only 20 percent demonstrate the ability to plan, an indicator of executive function,” he said.
He said these outcomes cannot be treated as an education problem alone because children’s readiness to learn is influenced by nutrition, health, responsive caregiving, protection, and the environment in which they grow.
He also identified six systemic gaps: the lack of a single accountable mechanism for children, weak referral obligations between service platforms, poor visibility of spending on children, the absence of shared child records, sector-specific rather than cross-sectoral training for frontline workers, and weak coordination mechanisms.
Funding for early learning identified as a major gap
According to Dr Muhammad, an analysis of ECD-related funding mapped across 2024–2026 found that the “opportunities for early learning” component recorded zero funding, while responsive caregiving received only ₦13 million, out of ₦582.7 billion tracked across the five nurturing-care components and related systems.
However, he said this does not necessarily mean that no money is being spent on early learning. It notes that about ₦101.3 billion in education and skills spending sits outside the classification used for responsive caregiving and early learning.
He therefore identifies both a financing gap and a budget-classification problem that makes it difficult to see how much is actually being invested in early childhood learning and caregiving.
The broader financing analysis found that about ₦2.6 trillion had been allocated to ECD-relevant activities at the subnational level. Still, only ₦724 billion had been expended, leaving an allocation-to-expenditure gap of about ₦1.9 trillion. Actual expenditure was estimated at approximately ₦3,011 per child under five in the period analyzed.
Five platforms proposed to reach children
Rather than creating an entirely new delivery system, the expert proposes layering ECD services onto existing platforms.
These include 35,200 primary healthcare centers, approximately 92,000 pre-schools and ECCDE centers, 58,000 Women’s Affinity Groups, farms and markets, and households across Nigeria’s 8,809 wards. The approach would also allow different platforms to provide complementary services.
He said, “Primary healthcare centers, for instance, would support antenatal and postnatal care, immunization and growth monitoring, while pre-schools would provide early learning and stimulation. Women’s groups would support parenting education, nutrition counseling and caregiver support, while community health workers would reach households with responsive-caregiving guidance and WASH practices.”
The proposed Early Years Agenda would organize services into three levels—Core, Essential and Expanded.
The proposed life-cycle package covers pregnancy, the first 1,000 days from birth to 23 months, the next 1,000 days from 24 to 59 months, and transition into primary school, including literacy, numeracy and school-readiness foundations.
ECD requires more than classrooms
Dr Muhammad, on the science of early childhood development, similarly emphasizes that early learning does not begin when a child enters a classroom.
He said every child needs five areas to thrive: good health and nutrition, responsive caregiving, early learning, safety and security, and support for caregivers. These include breastfeeding and vaccination, talking and playing with children, storytelling and counting with local objects, protection from violence and birth registration, and parent support and economic assistance.
He also stressed that much of development happens at home, giving civil society organizations an important role in supporting caregivers and filling gaps in health, nutrition, stimulation, and child protection.
From survival to school readiness
The proposed approach seeks to move Nigeria’s early childhood agenda beyond simply keeping children alive and towards ensuring that they arrive at primary school ready to learn.
According to him, the agenda is being developed under a proposed Nigeria Early Years Agenda 2027–2032, with stunting reduction and school readiness identified as central outcomes. We’ve worked with federal ministries, state actors, development partners, and other stakeholders through an Analytics Advisory Group and a proposed ECD Technical Working Group.
He called for technical assistance and complementary financing for state ECD investment plans, support for results-based financing, stronger federal coordination, and investment in innovation, research, and knowledge-sharing.
The proposed approach ultimately aims to ensure that every Nigerian child is “Ready by Five”—with the health, nutrition, protection, stimulation and early-learning foundations needed for a successful transition into primary education.
“Every interaction in the first 5 years builds a brain,” he said.
Also speaking, the National Coordinator, Open Government Partnership (OGP), Dr Gloria Ahmed, said Nigeria must strengthen coordination among government institutions, development partners, civil society organizations, communities, parents and caregivers to achieve better outcomes for children.
She said ECD is an investment in the nation’s human capital and future prosperity, not merely a social intervention.
She said, “Early childhood development is a critical foundation for the future of every nation. It is not merely a social intervention; it is an investment in human capital development and in the future prosperity of any nation.”
She said effective ECD delivery also required evidence-based planning, adequate financing, effective implementation and transparent monitoring.
She stated that open governance principles, including transparency, accountability, citizen participation and inclusive decision-making, were essential to achieving the desired outcomes.
Dr Ahmed also said civil society organizations were strategically positioned to amplify the voices of parents, caregivers and children; monitor service delivery and expenditure; promote public awareness; and hold institutions accountable for commitments to child development.
Also, the World Bank Task Team Leader, Early Childhood, Dr Ritgak Tilley-Gyado, said Nigeria’s child population made coordinated action particularly urgent, noting that the country has about 38 million children under five.
She said investments in healthcare, nutrition, responsive caregiving, parenting, protection and early learning during the formative years could significantly influence children’s educational outcomes, lifetime earnings and eventual contribution to national productivity.
Dr Tilley-Gyado highlighted that improving early childhood outcomes would require an all-of-society approach involving governments at all levels, development partners, civil society, traditional and faith institutions, the private sector and communities.
“What this agenda says is that the effort is to coalesce all of government horizontally across sectors, vertically across the four tiers of government,” she added.
The World Bank official said the greatest opportunity to improve Nigeria’s human capital lies with children in their early years because their physical growth, upbringing, and development can still be significantly influenced through appropriate interventions.
According to her, social accountability matters, and civil society is a critical voice for citizens and an important mechanism for ensuring that government and development partners fulfill their commitments.
She further said the initiative would also prioritize disability inclusion, environmental safeguards, and the protection of vulnerable populations as Nigeria strengthens its ECD interventions.
