The “technical sheets” of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR) indicate the intention to make 152,000 new places available in nursery schools. However, the intervention presents three critical points: (i) the objective is modest considering the current Italian situation; (ii) the constraints placed on the implementation of the plan in the PNRR are defined in a loosely manner; (iii) there are no details regarding the allocation of new posts on the national territory.
Included in mission 4, component 1, of the PNRR is a plan for daycare, preschool and early childhood education and care services (**). The investment, as specified in the Plan, aims to build, renovate and secure nurseries and schools in order to support the birth rate, invest in the education and well-being of children, and encourage female participation in the world of work.
The PNRR presented on April 30 to the European Commission indicated the intention to create 228,000 new places for nursery schools and kindergartens, at a cost of 4.6 billion, without, however, making a distinction between the two schools. However, the distinction is fundamental: while the availability of places in Italy is in the European average for kindergartens, we are far behind for nursery schools: coverage is 25.5 per cent.
However, in the draft data sheets attached to the PNRR that were disseminated later (but not published by official sources), it is specified that the places for nursery schools are 152,000. However, even with this specification, there are still some critical issues relating to the intervention that concern three points.
1. The ambition of the final goal
Assuming that the offer of places in nursery schools has remained unchanged compared to 2019 (355,289 places in 13,335 nurseries) and that the number of children between 0 and 3 years is equal to that estimated by the Istat demographic forecasts for 2026, adding the 152,000 seats foreseen by the plan, the coverage would reach 37 per cent, just above the target of 33 per cent set by the Barcelona European Council in 2002 (and which was to be achieved in 2010). As a comparison, consider that the Colao Plan set a coverage target of 60 percent to be achieved in 3 years.
2. The constraints proposed to achieve the goal
One of the functions of the cards is to precisely define the conditions that, if met, will allow the disbursement of NGEU funding. Hence the importance of what is written in the cards and specifically in the part that sets certain “targets” and certain “milestones” relating to the various projects.
With regard to nurseries and preschools, the cards include only:
a) a milestone for the second quarter of 2023, which provides for the adoption of a single plan for kindergartens and preschools with details on the number of works awarded by type and territorial distribution and all related employment contracts to kindergartens and early childhood services.
b) A target for the fourth quarter of 2025 which provides for the availability of 228,000 places without distinguishing between nursery schools and preschools. So the goal is delayed in time, without intermediate stages, and without a specific goal for nursery schools. As indicated, in the text of the cards we speak of 152,000 places intended exclusively for nurseries, but what counts for the provision of resources (and, therefore, the real constraint) is the one that is reported as a target and the latter does not contain nothing specific about nurseries.
3. The subdivision of posts on the national territory
To date, the offer of early childhood services in Italy is very heterogeneous. As mentioned, national coverage is 25.5 percent, but in Calabria it is only 10 percent, while in Valle d’Aosta it is 47 percent. At present, the PNRR does not present details about the division of the 152,000 seats on the national territory. This information would seem to have to be included in the plan mentioned in point (2a) of the previous section and therefore it should be known by 2023. But even in this case, the actual conformity of the territorial distribution of the places created with this plan would not be relevant to end of achieving the target set for 2025, which currently refers only to the entire national territory.
* by the Observatory on Italian Public Accounts
(**) With “nursery schools” we refer to services for the education of children under 3, while for “kindergarten” we refer to services for the education of children from 3 to 6 years