A project to improve dietary diversity and nutritional status of women of reproductive age has been implemented in the Sekyere East, Kintampo South and the Kasenna Nankana districts.

Known as the “Improved feeding practices for the first 1,000 days,” the initiative was carried out by the World Vision Ghana (WVG), a not-for-profit organisation in collaboration with the World Bank, the Japan Social Development Fund and Ghana Health Service.

Nutrition

Malnutrition or undernutrition is a deficiency that poses a serious health hazard to both adults and children. The condition is said to be caused by the lack of good eating, not eating the right food with the right nutrient or the inability of the body to utilise the food eaten rightly to benefit the body as required.

Although malnutrition has been identified as one of the leading causes of death in all ages, research has detected that the condition makes children in particular much more vulnerable to death.

In that vein, the World Vision Ghana and its partners were compelled to implement “improved feeding practices for the first 1,000 days” as a survey to have an intervention to aid in discovering the main causes of the canker.

It was also to detect the badly affected areas with malnutrition in the country, embark on intensive education on how to prevent the deadly condition and lend a helping hand to the affected communities.

The project was aimed at increasing access to nutritious foods, improving household-level agriculture and creating nutrition awareness through nutrition messaging.

As its contribution to improving community livelihood, the organisation distributed micronutrient-rich vegetables and fruit seedlings such as moringa, orange-fleshed sweet potato, pawpaw, mangoes and poultry birds to vulnerable households with nutrition messaging.

Household

A total of 1,609 households received the starter crop as support from the WVG. Briefing the media on the purpose and achievement of the project, the Health Technical Programme Manager of the World Vision Ghana, Awurabena Quayeba Dadzie, described the prevailing poor dietary condition as a very serious national canker and said it called for a collaborative effort of all stakeholders to effectively fight it.

“This project is aimed at helping to support, as well as educate Ghanaian rural communities on how to improve their diets to attain the necessary nutrition the body requires for healthy living. It is also to help the rural folks to identify and be able to grow more nutrition-enriched crops to benefit their families,” Ms Dadzie added.

She observed that malnutrition is a major impediment to socio-economic development at both the individual and national levels. She said when citizens were poorly nourished, their cognitive and physical performance was compromised and productivity was ultimately impaired.

Other expertise explored by the survey, according to Ms Dadzie also revealed that poor dietary intake by women was associated with micronutrient deficiencies and makes women vulnerable to poor maternal health outcomes and poor birth outcomes for their babies.

She, therefore, indicated that improving minimum dietary diversity was key to improved Reproductive, Maternal, Neonatal and Child and Adolescents Health (RMNCAH) outcomes.