Saudi Arabia is set to drive the next major phase of early childhood education (ECE) expansion across the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), accounting for around three-quarters of the kindergarten build required under Arthur D. Little’s (ADL) near-universal regional enrollment scenario for 2035.
The findings are published in ADL’s new Viewpoint, From Cradle to Classroom: Why early childhood education is a high-return opportunity & how GCC countries can seize it, which identifies early childhood as a significant human-capital and workforce opportunity for Saudi Arabia and the wider GCC.
Across the region, ADL estimates that reaching its near-universal (95% kindergarten enrollment) benchmark by 2035 would require approximately 11,600 new kindergartens and 116,000 additional kindergarten educators. Saudi Arabia’s scale means the Kingdom represents the largest component of this regional capacity-building opportunity.
The opportunity is also immediate. Across the GCC, ADL finds that roughly 94% of the kindergarten build required under this scenario reflects existing access and quality requirements rather than future growth in the number of young children.
Amr Kazimi, Principal at Arthur D. Little, said: “Saudi Arabia has the scale and ambition to drive the next phase of early childhood education development across the GCC. The capacity that can be created over the coming decade represents much more than an expansion of education infrastructure — it is an opportunity to develop a major professional workforce, strengthen the foundations of future human capital and support the Kingdom’s wider economic transformation.”
The opportunity is closely connected to Saudi Arabia’s broader workforce transformation. Female labor-force participation increased from 17% in 2016 to 36% in 2025, exceeding the Kingdom’s Vision 2030 target of 30%. Accessible and high-quality early childhood provision can help sustain that trajectory by enabling more parents, particularly women, to enter and remain in the workforce.
ADL therefore argues that early childhood education can create a rare “double return” for Saudi Arabia: strengthening the capabilities of the generation that will contribute to the Kingdom’s future economy while simultaneously supporting participation in today’s workforce.
Yigit Saf, Partner at Arthur D. Little, said: “Early childhood education has a direct connection to Saudi Arabia’s human-capital and economic transformation agenda. Investment in the early years can generate two complementary returns: building the skills and capabilities of tomorrow’s workforce while enabling more people to contribute to the economy today. The scale of Saudi Arabia’s opportunity makes quality, workforce development and execution particularly important as the sector expands.”
Across the wider GCC, different markets face different early childhood priorities. The UAE currently leads regional preprimary participation at approximately 82%, with much of its remaining expansion opportunity in the nursery years. Other markets have opportunities to broaden access, strengthen educator capacity or extend provision further into the earliest stages of childhood.
ADL’s analysis finds that broadening the ambition beyond kindergarten could increase the scale of the regional opportunity substantially. Extending meaningful formal provision to the currently underserved nursery segment, based on a 40% enrollment scenario, would bring the requirement to approximately 40,000 early childhood institutions — kindergartens and nurseries — and 224,000 educators across the GCC.
The long-term economics reinforce the case for investment. Research cited in the Viewpoint finds that high-quality, comprehensive programs from birth to age five can generate returns of approximately 13% per child per year, equivalent to around US$6 in benefits for every US$1 invested. This compares with estimated returns of 7%-10% for preschool alone.
Yet early childhood remains structurally underfunded globally. Around 175 million children are not enrolled in preprimary education, while only 6.6% of education budgets are directed to the subsector on average. UNICEF recommends allocating at least 10% of education spending to preprimary education.
ADL argues that expansion should therefore focus not only on creating places but also on protecting quality. The Viewpoint identifies three constraints that need to be addressed alongside capacity: workforce shortages, quality and regulation, and parental engagement.
The firm also calls for a more integrated approach spanning the full early childhood value chain — from the first 1,000 days, through preprimary education at ages three to five, to the transition into primary school. This includes stronger coordination across education, healthcare and labor policy; investment in educator quality; appropriate child-to-staff ratios; greater parental involvement; and carefully governed use of AI-enabled learning and educator-support tools.
Kazimi concluded: “Saudi Arabia has an opportunity to build early childhood capacity in parallel with the wider transformation of its economy. The priority is not simply scale, but high-quality scale — creating the institutions, professional workforce and standards that allow investment in the early years to deliver its full economic and human-capital return.”
