Six Early Childhood Development (ECD) Centres that were launched in Tajikistan last year under the support of AKDN now successfully function in the country. An official source at the Ministry of Education and Science said the Aga Khan Foundation (AKF) had made a noticeable contribution fort the creation of decent conditions for early development of children in the country and added that 283 preschool children’s development centres had been established at the general educational institutions in the Gorno Badakhshan Autonomous Region in collaboration with AKF and 482 teachers were engaged in educating and raising more than 6,500 children at these centres. The Ministry of Education and Science emphasised that it would continue collaborating with AKDN on supporting early childhood development.