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Ammon News - The Social Development Ministry seeks to increase the number of licensed nurseries in the Kingdom with the aim of realising several goals, Amer Hiasat, director of Family and Protection at the ministry, said on Sunday.

Speaking to the Jordan News Agency, Petra, Hiasat said that increasing the number of nurseries will provide jobs for women, create some 70,000 jobs and realise goals in developing early childhood education.

He noted that the ministry's strategic plan for 2022-2026 focuses on programmes that seek to develop early childhood education in a way that matches the national strategy for social protection.

Hiasat noted that the national strategy for human resources development 2015-2025 mainly focuses on developing early childhood education, including nurseries. The strategy shows that only 3 per cent of nursery-age children will actually join these facilities, he added.

The director noted that the latest study shows that 1 per cent of the total children in Jordan are enrolled in nurseries out of 1.4 million children. To accommodate the total number of nursery-age children in the Kingdom, 40,000 nurseries would need to be established. Only 1,159 licensed nurseries are currently operating, according to the director.

The ministry also told Petra that it had issued regulations for licensing unlicensed home nurseries, but so far only two nurseries have received licences despite the fact that there are no costs for the licensing procedures.

The ministry also said that it is open for cooperation with all partners of civil and private institutions and organisations to prepare policies and empowering mechanisms to increase the number of nurseries in various public sectors, civil community institutions and the private sector.