Funding early childhood development remains a challenge, but there's hope now that Finance Minister, Enoch Godongwana, has increased the ECD allocation. This is the largest single increase in ECD funding in South Africa’s history. This will go a long way in providing much-needed support to practitioners so that they are able to deliver essential care, nutrition and early learning stimulation to children. As a result, about 700 000 children from low-income households enrolled in ECD programmes who did not receive the government subsidy will now have access to it. We are in conversation with Chief Platform and Programme Officer at SmartStart,  Lazola Makhupula is in conversation with us to speak about persisting challenges in the Early childhood development space.