tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3932940408427512390.post6502136658153077700..comments2023-05-18T05:37:31.861-07:00Comments on Global Health Challenges 2015: Farming for Child Health: A Pilot Project to End Hunger in HospitalsBrittanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408888004805996062noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3932940408427512390.post-87629669982769653732015-12-02T15:21:04.980-08:002015-12-02T15:21:04.980-08:00Thanks Emily for sharing an insightful part of you...Thanks Emily for sharing an insightful part of your experience. It is encouraging to see that K.U is counting success right from its initial stages. I was looking at the WHO framework for malnutrition which classifies the etiology of malnutrition into immediate, basic and underlying causes. The immediate causes include inadequate food intake and ill health. The two immediate causes are interrelated whereby one cause leads to the other making it very difficult to treat any illness without addressing the nutritional aspect. In respect to this, I really like KU’s approach of incorporating food provision to hospitalized patients thus addressing the immediate causes of malnutrition. This approach has been shown to not only address malnutrition but also reduce child mortality and illnesses such as diarrhea which can be linked to poor nutrition. Another aspect of the project I really like is the family education component on sustainable farming and healthy affordable nutrition; however, I would be interested in knowing whether there are any specific follow ups that will be made to these families to determine whether the knowledge impacted is translated to practice and to the children way after they are discharged from the hospital to assess their progress. <br />Loise Ng'ang'ahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07974685919319872032noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3932940408427512390.post-12850501256387234272015-11-29T14:14:36.293-08:002015-11-29T14:14:36.293-08:00Emily,
This program you talk about seems like a ...Emily, <br /><br />This program you talk about seems like a great initiative that targets a really dire need. I really like how you involved various local community organizations to reach your goals. Additionally, I'm curious to know about your plans to make this program more sustainable, since that is a concern for almost all programs such as this. To be quite honest, I never considered the nutritional support that hospitals provide, I guess its something I always took for granted. However, it is obviously crucial to a patients recovery so I can see why you and your team made it such a priority. I also like how your group was very conscious about the types of animals you chose to invest (i.e goats over cows), I am curious to know about the pros and cons for choosing one animal over another. Thank you for sharing this project with us! Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08868363485377726786noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3932940408427512390.post-55662590744925957962015-11-23T19:43:16.812-08:002015-11-23T19:43:16.812-08:00Thanks Brittany and Emily for sharing your stories...Thanks Brittany and Emily for sharing your stories. So inspiring! Im so proud of you guys for dedicating so much time to uplift those in need so far away. The most fascinating thing I find about both the Kuzamura Ubuzima and the Kayonza project with Partners in Health is that it is combining agriculture and nutrition and there is the community participation aspect in leading the implementation of the program. This is very important for sustainability of the project as many great initiatives kick off and fade away when originators of the idea leave the community.<br /><br />There should be sufficient time, capacity and skills developed by the communities to meet daily challenges and address them together and own the project. These group dynamics and collaborations will give them the necessary first hand experience to address their won problems. It would be great to evaluate the Kuzamura Ubuzima project and see what challenges and lessons learned are critical before the scaling to other parts of Rwanda.Caesar Lubanga-kenehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14387520539474924285noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3932940408427512390.post-83028980945495765752015-11-21T08:01:53.875-08:002015-11-21T08:01:53.875-08:00Thanks Emily for the great information about F4CH ...Thanks Emily for the great information about F4CH in Rwanda. <br /><br />This summer I was briefly in Rwanda, and spent time with Partners in Health (http://www.pih.org/) in Southern Kayonza province learning about a similar program, their Food Security and Livelihoods program. It’s an Income Generating Activity (IGA) and type of micro-finance/social entrepreneurship program where communities form small groups or co-operatives and buy chickens to generate income (via selling eggs, or later, hopefully selling the chickens). As you mentioned, this has also been in response to childhood malnutrition; initially the program was started for mothers after their child was hospitalized. Thus, to prevent malnutrition hospitalization again (many times from poverty and lack of access to food). PIH and their partners wanted to get to the root cause of the problem and prevent malnutrition by creating a sustainable IGA that was community-based and community-owned. <br /><br />We visited a local women’s group who were just about ready to purchase their chickens. They shared their story, showed us their impeccable accounting book, and we were able to see the construction of their new chicken coop. After seeing these women in the early stages of their project, we visited a man who had grown his small co-op into a large chicken enterprise where he housed over 2,000 cage-free chickens in a two story chicken coop! He had expanded to include two cows and was giving back to the program by being an ‘advisor’ to other co-op groups on how to grow their businesses and sharing his success and failures in his journey. <br /><br />I have heard of similar programs in other settings, but I really enjoyed seeing the implementation at different stages – the group of women starting a small company to sell eggs and band together for months to plan and grow their tiny business building a coop to house about ten chickens, and then see the success of another person in later stages was such a cool experience. Knowing that these families are hopefully better equipped to prevent malnutrition – both through the IGA, new skill set, and through a source of available food – is also exciting.<br /><br />Best,<br />Brittney <br />Brittneyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16408314662712840279noreply@blogger.com