Address by the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev at the World Conference on Early Childhood Care and Education
I sincerely congratulate you on the opening of the Second World Conference on Early Childhood Care and Education in Tashkent. Distinguished conference participants! Ladies and gentlemen! I sincerely congratulate you on the opening of the Second World Conference on Early Childhood Care and Education in Tashkent. I extend my sincere gratitude and best wishes to the distinguished guests, the heads of international organizations, the ministers and representatives of foreign countries participating in the international conference. Welcome to Uzbekistan, dear guests! Dear friends! We are particularly gratified that Madam Azoulay, the Director-General of UNESCO, is personally participating at the opening ceremony of the international conference. In recent years, our cooperation with UNESCO in the areas of education, science, cultural heritage, information and communication has been rapidly developing. In particular, with the support of this Organization, we have been effectively implementing a number of significant programs and projects to preserve the world cultural heritage sites in our country, restore existed ancient Great Silk Road cultural ties, improve the quality of the education system and raise comprehensively developedgeneration, and ensure Uzbekistan youth professional capacity building. Taking this opportunity, I would like to express my appreciation to Madam Audrey Azoulay and all our foreign partners for their contribution to this important and noble endeavor. Distinguished conference participants! Undeniably, there is a number of challenges in providing a qualified preschool education for young children worldwide. In many countries, the preschool education is not provided for nearly 200 million children, which limits their access to primary education. In its turn, it is no secret that the coronavirus pandemic has had an enormous negative impact on the education sector over the next few years. In the time of such challenges, it is clearly important for all countries to deepen close cooperation, as well as for our people to unite and solve issues together. In this regard, I believe that today’s conference will help us generate new approaches and solutions to the issue of children’s education, which is considered an important direction of the Sustainable Development Goals. Dear friends! Based on the principle that "human dignity, his rights and interests are the highest value", we have defined the creation of decent living conditions for the people of our country as a priority of the New Uzbekistan’s policy. In this regard, we attach great importance, above all, to the care and practical support of young people and children, raising them physically healthy and spiritually mature generation. Through early childhood development and providing a decent learning environment, we are building a solid foundation for children’s full self-expression in the future. Indeed, there is no doubt that the investments spent in the path of such a noble goal will pay off several times over in the future. Along with this, all of us are well aware that the basis of the child’s personality is formed at the preschool age, during which the foundation for his intellectual and physical development is created. Currently, there are about 3 million children of preschool age in our country. Undoubtedly, they are our most valuable treasure, the creators of our free and prosperous life and our bright future. It is also worth mentioning that in the recent past, the preschool enrollment rate fell to 27%. Almost all preschool institutions lacked modern technologies and manuals, and their facilities were under renovation. This has limited the opportunity of our children to receive full quality education and upbringing. Whereas, the role and importance of the preschool education system in our social life, which is considered to be the most important link in the upbringing of our children, cannot be measured and overstated. From the early days of reforms, we have decided to fundamentally modernize the existing education sector, in particular, the preschool education. For this purpose, and for the first time in the history of our country, we established a Ministry of Preschool Education. We place great emphasis on raising kindergartens to a new level according to time requirements, wide application of advanced methods and techniques, and strengthening the educational and material base. We have created favorable conditions for the entry of the private sector to the extensive development of the industry. The State budget subsidies were also available for each foster child in kindergartens. In recent years, the number of kindergartens in our country has increased sixfold. Thousands of family kindergartens were established in remote and out-of-way areas. The number of educators and teachers has also increased threefold and reached 160, 000. Furthermore, practical work has been undertaken to improve the qualifications of more than 160,000 pedagogic personnel This, in turn, provided an opportunity to increase the number of children receiving education and training in kindergartens from 600 thousand to 2 million, the rate of children’s coverage increased to 70%. Distinguished conference participants! You are well aware of the wise saying, " Life is a constant learning experience." Therefore, in the course of democratic reforms in Uzbekistan, we are prioritizing raising the education system to the level of modern requirements. In particular, more than 10,000 secondary schools are currently operating in our country. In recent years, the number of higher educational institutions has increased by almost 2.5 times and reached 186. 31 of them are branches of the world's leading universities and institutes. It is worth noting that the university admission quota has increased by 3.5 times and enrollment in higher education increased from 9% to 38%. It is well known that our country, located at the crossroads of the Great Silk Road, has...