More than AED26 million is being invested in two new education projects that aim to help tens of thousands of children in Tanzania.

The initiatives, launched by Dubai Cares, will focus on early childhood development in the East African country over a four-year period.

The announcement follows a visit to the country to inspect schools and see what work is currently being undertaken there.

"It gives my team and I great pleasure to witness the success of our pre-primary education programmes in East Africa," said Tariq Al Gurg, chief executive of Dubai Cares.

"In recent years, the Government of Tanzania has achieved great progress in facilitating access to early education programmes for children.

"Building on such progress, we must turn our attention to the quality of these and tackle challenges such as shortage of qualified pre-primary teachers and adequate materials."

An estimated 54,400 children will benefit over the course of the project with a total investment of AED 26,670,430.

The programme in mainland Tanzania named "Fursa kwa Watoto", which is Kiswahili for "Opportunities for children", seeks to improve access to and quality of pre-primary education and reach more than 29,400 children.

A second project in Zanzibar aims to provide pre-primary schooling for around 25,000 four and five-year-olds.

It will also look at training more teachers and bring down the current student teacher ratio of 1:115.

The projects are being conducted in partnership with Tanzania’s Ministry of Education, Science Technology and Vocational Training, Children in Crossfire, the United Nations Children’s Fund, Aga Khan University, and Mathematica Policy Research, the Madrasa Early Childhood Programme in Zanzibar and the Ministry of Education and Vocational Training in Zanzibar.

The lessons learnt from these projects will be used to inform policymakers in Tanzania, and the rest of Africa.