Figures from the Education Senate have revealed that Berlin has thousands more available spaces at Kitas than originally thought, due to falling birthrates in the city.
Berlin’s Senate for Education, Youth and Family has released figures which reveal thousands of newly available Kita spaces in the capital.
According to numerous previous assessments, state childcare facilities had a serious shortage of available spaces. The 2022 Kita Report by the German Education and Science Union (GEW) warned that half of all childcare centres in Germany were being forced to reduce capacity due to staff shortages.
A 2023 study by the Federal Institute for Population (BiB) also found that children from non-German or poorer families were disproportionately affected by the shortage, being less likely to get a spot when needed.
While the staff shortage is still reducing Kita capacity across the country, Berlin’s Education Senate explained that the situation has changed in the capital. In June 2024, the city’s state-run Kitas had 1.565 spots available for new children and in privately-run Kitas, there were 7.215 free spots.
The situation is also improving in the city of Brandenburg an der Havel, there were 553 available spaces in August 2024, 130 more spaces than one year previously.
Children in Germany are legally entitled to a free space at a state-run childcare facility before they are old enough to start school, if parents cannot find a free spot for their children, the government covers the cost of private childcare.
According to the Senate, the falling birthrate in the capital is the main reason so many Kita spots have been freed up in the past few years. 40.000 babies were born in Berlin in 2018, compared to the 34.000 born in 2023.
This is a trend across Germany and many other countries. In March 2024, the BiB reported that the number of live births in Germany fell significantly in 2023, falling to 1,36 children per birth parent, a low not seen since 2009.
A July 2024 report from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation (OECD) confirmed that Germany is not an exception. In the past 60 years, the number of children born in OECD countries, which includes Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland and the UK, has fallen by half, from 3,3 per mother in 1960 to 1,5 children in 2024.
With more people waiting to have children or deciding to remain child-free, Germany is currently reckoning with a considerable shift in age demographics: according to the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis), by 2060 one in five people in Germany will be retired.
One major consequence of the changing demographics is already tangible; a record high worker shortage. To plug the gaps, politicians in the traffic light coalition hope that new policies, such as the Chancenkarte, easing citizenship rules and a tax break for newly-arrived workers, will entice new migrants.
Thumb image credit: Mo Photography Berlin / Shutterstock.com