In the 2021/22 kindergarten year, a total of 73,933 children under the age of three and 251,589 children between the ages of three and five attended a childcare facility. In Austria, almost every third child (29.1 percent) under the age of three was in care in the 2021/22 kindergarten year. This is a new high, according to current figures from Statistics Austria. The proportion of all children under the age of five in institutional care rose to 94.1 percent (2021: 93.0).
Ten years ago, in the 2011/12 kindergarten year, only every fifth child (19.7 percent) under the age of three had been in a childcare facility; in all age groups combined, the figure was 90.9 percent. Statistics Austria includes crèches and small child care facilities (small children’s crèches, crèches), kindergartens (general kindergartens, integration, special and practice kindergartens), after-school care centers and mixed-age care facilities.
The highest percentage of children under the age of three in day-care centers is in Vienna (44.3), lowest in Styria (18.6) and Upper Austria (19.6). Besides Vienna, only Burgenland (37.0) and Vorarlberg (30.9) are above the Austrian average of 29.1 percent. However, there was growth in all federal states compared to the previous year.
Viewed in individual years, more than half of the children aged two attend a childcare facility throughout Austria (57.9); for one-year-olds, the care rate is 26.4 percent. In contrast, only 2.1 percent of children who have not yet reached the age of one are housed in day-care centers.
Source: Nachrichten
