All licensed childcare facilities in Nunavut must follow the Northwest Territories Child Day Care Act and Regulations that was adopted by the Nunavut Government on April 1, 1999. The links to the Child Day Care Act and Regulations are below:

Child Day Care Act

Child Day Care Regulations

The Early Childhood Program provides start-up and annual operating funding to eligible non-profit licensed childcare facilities and family day homes.

Early Childhood Development Agreement
As signatories to the September 2000 First Ministers’ Communiqué on Early Childhood Development (ECD) the Government of Nunavut is committed to the development of an early childhood system grounded in the growing body of knowledge on the importance of the early years. Nunavut's Early Childhood Development Expenditures and Programs: Baseline Report 2000/2001 and Update Reports are part of Nunavut’s commitment to the ECD Agreement. For a copy of the reports follow the links below.

Early Learning and Child Care Agreement
In March 2003, Federal, Provincial, and Territorial Ministers responsible for Social Services agreed on a framework for improving access to affordable, quality, provincially and territorially regulated early learning and child care programs and services. The goals of this agreement are to increase the number of child care and preschool spaces, to reduce the cost of child care and preschool services for low- and modest-income families, and to improve the quality of child care and preschool services. As part of this agreement the Government of Nunavut released a baseline report for the 2002-2003 fiscal year and Update Reports. These reports are combined with the ECD reports and can be found at the links above.

Healthy Children Initiative
The vision of the Healthy Children Initiative (HCI) is "healthy children born to healthy parents, growing up in strong and supportive families in caring communities."

The Healthy Children Initiative provides financial support to organizations and communities for programs and services which try to achieve this vision. HCI emphasizes a holistic approach where young people, parents and families and communities are part of an important network that works to develop healthy babies who grow into healthy children.

HCI has two pots of money - Community Initiatives and Supportive Child Services.

* Community Initiatives provide funding for the enhancement or development of early childhood intervention programs and services for children 0 - 6 years of age and their families.
* Supportive Child Services provides funding on an individual basis for children requiring intensive support or specific assistance. This may include supported childcare, occupational therapy, physiotherapy, speech and language therapy and supports, and supports to enable children to attend centre-based early childhood programs.

For more information on the Early Childhood Program or Healthy Children Initiative contact the Early Childhood Officer for your Region: