Latin America and the Caribbean remain the most unequal regions in the world. Employment, housing conditions, wages, and access to health and education reveal profound disparities, and addressing them can feel overwhelming. Early childhood offers a solid starting point, as many of these inequalities begin in the earliest years of life. What challenges and progress does Mexico show in this regard?
A recent panel held during the launch of the Early Childhood Center (Centro de Primera Infancia) at Tecnológico de Monterrey outlined the state of child development in the country and presented innovative action plans. The panel featured Save the Children Mexico, the Pact for Early Childhood, and the IDB, and called for action to improve the quality of early childhood care, sustain measurement efforts, and tailor interventions to the local context. What information did we share?
1. Child Poverty Is High, and Socioeconomic Gaps in Language Development Are Significant
The panel highlighted that, according to the National Council for the Evaluation of Social Development Policy (CONEVAL) over half of Mexico’s children under six live in poverty. And when we delve deeper into the data of the National Health and Nutrition Survey (ENSANUT 2021-22), we see that 13 out of every 100 children suffer from chronic malnutrition; two-thirds of children under 6 months did not receive exclusive breastfeeding, and almost 6 out of 10 did not receive the full vaccination schedule in their first year of life.
These deficits have a direct impact on child development. Data from the 2018 ENSANUT, show that between the ages of 3 and 5, truly dramatic gaps in language development are generated between children whose mothers have more or less schooling. By age five, children whose mothers have only primary education or less show language skills equivalent to those of 3.5-year-olds whose mothers have completed secondary education—a developmental lag of nearly a year and a half.
2. Access to Early Education Services Is Insufficient and Unequal
Only 7% of children under three have access to child development or early education programs in any of their modalities (ENSANUT, 2022). Furthermore, there is less coverage in urban areas, even though 75% of children under 5 live in cities. Additionally, according to the Ministry of Public Education (SEP), one out of every two children between 3 and 5 years of age does not attend preschool.
In addition, the pandemic worsened the situation with the definitive closure of several centers and the recovery of enrolled children has not yet been complete.
3. Quality of Interactions in Child Care Centers Is Low
A recent nationwide study titled “A snapshot of the quality of child care centers and the state of child development in Mexico in children under three years of age” showed that, although the centers are safe spaces, with adequate equipment and infrastructure, where children have play materials within their reach and where a wide variety of activities are carried out, there is still great room for improvement in the quality of interactions and emotional and motivational support for learning in the classroom.
4. Coordinated Action for Public Policy Implementation at the National Level Is a Complex Process
Aranzazu Alonso emphasized that advancing large-scale policies for early childhood requires coordinated action among families, government, civil society, international organizations, academia, and the private sector.
The greatest achievement in this area to date has been the National Strategy for Early Childhood Care (ENAPI)–the first comprehensive, intersectoral and intergovernmental policy aimed at guaranteeing sensitive and loving care for the wellbeing of early childhood. The challenge now is to further institutionalize its progress, integrate it into budgetary programs that link objectives and resources, and ensure that, at the legislative level, implementation has an intersectoral mandate.
Facing These Challenges: What Solutions Do We Have?
The first five years of life represent a unique window of opportunity to invest in human capital: interventions made during this stage have lifelong impacts and generate economic benefits far greater than their costs.
To advance in this area, three key solutions were highlighted:
1. Sustaining Measurement Efforts: Measurement and evaluation are essential to understanding whether progress is being made and how. The good news is that Mexico has dared to make efforts such as the ENSANUT and the diagnosis of quality of care in centers, carried out in alliance with the IDB.
2. Tailoring Actions to Context: David Calderón emphasized the importance of differentiated attention in urban, semi-rural, and rural settings, as well as for children in mobility contexts (children in conditions of displacement and migration). In all these settings, play, quality interactions with their caregivers (parents, educators) and their community are fundamental. It is also important to offer comprehensive care that promotes breastfeeding and healthy eating, always with a focus on activation and tender parenting. For its part, the reality of children in mobility also requires raising awareness among civil society and civil servants about their specific needs.
3. Improving the Quality of Care: Before expanding the coverage of childcare services, it is necessary to enhance their quality. Based on the aforementioned study, the IDB has worked together with IMSS in the construction of the “Programa Luciérnaga” (Firefly Program), a model of continuous training, through mentoring, aimed at caregivers to strengthen the quality of interactions and support them in the implementation of 12 prioritized practices that promote child development. The strategies are oriented to the recognition of children’s achievements, the expansion of their communication attempts through linguistic modeling and scaffolding in learning, among others.
Thanks to progress in these three determinants of child development, Mexico is generating valuable evidence to continue shaping solutions that will strengthen early childhood policies across the region. Stay tuned to learn more about early childhood in this country!
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