Incheon City announced on the 2nd that it has newly designated 20 public-type daycare centers to provide high-quality childcare services.
The city designated 6 home daycare centers and 14 private daycare centers as public-type daycare centers through evaluations by the relevant local governments and Incheon City, targeting over 40 applicants who participated in the public contest.
With this new designation, the number of public-type daycare centers in Incheon increased from the existing 129 to 149. Public-type daycare centers are childcare facilities that select outstanding home and private daycare centers to provide high-quality childcare services comparable to national and public daycare centers and support their operating expenses.
Children at a public daycare center are participating in a nature experience learning activity. [Photo by Incheon City]
Following the additional designations, the proportion of children in Incheon using national/public/public-type/Incheon-type daycare centers (public childcare utilization rate) rose by 4.5 percentage points from last year to 44.8%. The Incheon-type daycare centers create a safe childcare environment by lowering the teacher-to-infant child ratio.
Since 2011, the city has been expanding public-type daycare centers annually to improve accessibility to public childcare. After designating 10 centers in 2022 and 13 centers last year, this year the number increased to 20, raising the number of new designations each year. This is to allow parents to choose public-type daycare centers near their residences.
An official from Incheon City stated, "We expect the daycare centers designated as public-type this year to serve as an important pillar of Incheon City's public childcare and provide high-quality childcare services."
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