The “Workshop on Good Practices and Inter-Agency Cooperation on Early Childhood Care” held with the participation of representatives from international organisations, public institutions, local governments, civil society, workers’ and employers’ organisations comprehensively discussed the good practices of early childhood care services, potential for creating decent work for women as well as roles of various social actors, financial and organisational structures, and their capacity for sustainability and replicability.

At the workshop, Ms. Özen Tümer, EBRD Coordinator of Gender Programme made a presentation “Economic Inclusiveness and Development Perspective in Private Sector Investments” and Ms. Ebru Özberk Anlı, ILO Senior Programme Officer, provided information on the “More and Better Jobs for Women Programme and ILO’s Perspective on the Issue”.

Workshop results will be a guidance for recommendations for early childhood care services

Participants engaging in group work at the workshop comprehensively discussed individual employer practices of early childhood care services, practices pioneered by employers in cooperation, union-led services, municipal childcare centres, neighbourhood nurseries and home care services in terms of advantages and challenges.

At the end of group work, each group presented its work where every category of service was analysed in terms of legislation, financing, administration, monitoring and evaluation, supervision and contributions to women, families and children.

The outputs from the workshop are will be compiled in a research report and serve as a guide for recommendations for early childhood care services to be developed in the upcoming period.

ILO-EBRD work will also review national and international literature

The ILO Office for Turkey and EBRD launched a work in 2019 to review the current situation of early childhood care services in Turkey and in the world and develop recommendations for early childhood care services which could be undertaken by the private sector in coordination with the public sector, workers’ and employers’ associations and civil society. A research study is also planned in this context including one-on-one interviews with the relevant parties in Turkey to elicit information on current practices, and conduct a review of national and international literature.

The first workshop was held by the ILO Turkey Office and EBRD on 10 October 2019 with the participation of the relevant key stakeholders to elicit concrete recommendations on practices that might be undertaken in cooperation with various institutions in Turkey early childhood care services. ILO Turkey Office and EBRD plan to hold other workshops on the issue.