Community Nutrition Project (Kanchanrup Municipality, Saptari)

 

 

Back­ground

The south­ern flat­lands of Nepal, known as the Terai, are the most densely pop­u­lated area of Nepal. Despite having the highest levels of agri­cul­ture pro­duc­tion in the country, Terai com­mu­ni­ties suffer from the poorest results in health and devel­op­ment surveys.

NPCS was chal­lenged to take its com­mu­nity nutri­tion work into this region after decades of expe­ri­ence working in the middle-hills of Nepal. A part­ner­ship with local gov­ern­ment author­i­ties of Kan­chan­rup Munic­i­pal­ity was iden­ti­fied. This is one of the need­i­est areas in the south­east of the country and is home to over 63,000 people, close to the flood-prone Koshi River.

The project started early in 2022 with the aim to improve the nutri­tion of vul­ner­a­ble women and chil­dren in the area.

This project is funded by Misean Cara, Ireland and Wesley Foun­da­tion, Japan.

Project activ­i­ties

Some of our project activ­i­ties include:

• Spe­cialised coun­selling and regular follow ups at home for preg­nant women and new mothers
• Train­ing for local women’s groups and for fathers
• Regular growth mon­i­tor­ing for under‑5 chil­dren and follow ups with mal­nour­ished kids
• Explain­ing basic con­cepts of food, nutri­tion and a bal­anced diet
• Teach­ing people how to grow, cook and prepare easily avail­able local foods
• Train­ing teach­ers and sup­port­ing ado­les­cent stu­dents in healthy eating habits
• Helping small groups of women to produce ‘super­flour’ (a nutri­tious weaning food) for sale to local fam­i­lies and for dis­tri­b­u­tion to needy children
• Running model veg­etable gardens at selected schools to target the high levels of junk food consumption
• Con­tribut­ing to com­mu­nity cel­e­bra­tions and exhi­bi­tions to promote good nutri­tion and local foods.