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Rural child nutrition project places communities at the helm
20 February 2019
Researchers from health, education, engineering and environmental backgrounds are leading an innovative project to improve child nutrition, focused on infant feeding practices, led by 香港六合彩中特网 with Save the Children, Indian Institute of Technology Delhi and Jawaharlal Nehru University
The community mobilisation project, known as PANChSHEEEL, is based in rural Rajasthan, India, and is co-led by 香港六合彩中特网 Institute of Education鈥檚 (IOE) and 香港六合彩中特网鈥檚 Pro-Vice-Provost (South Asia) .
The project, funded by the UK鈥檚 Medical Research Council (MRC) and Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF), takes a holistic and community view of infant feeding practices, including different facets of nutrition, hygiene, sanitation and parent-child interactions, alongside policy recommendations from both the health and sociocultural perspective.
India faces a triple burden of childhood malnutrition: according to the Global Nutrition Report 2018, 38% of children under five are stunted, childhood obesity is on the rise, and most children have a micronutrient deficiency.
The Government of India has been implementing nutrition and behaviour change projects but barriers include outreach, variable levels of sanitation, social inequity, and the effectiveness of local integration.
This project takes a participatory approach by working closely with people in rural communities of Rajasthan鈥檚 Banswara region, including families and community leaders. The academic leads have been training community champions to engage with their communities, and have been consulting with them at every stage to ensure that every solution has been co-developed with community members.
The team has developed a socio-culturally appropriate, tailored, integrated and interdisciplinary intervention package, centred on schools as places of community mobilisation, linked in with Anganwadi (rural child care centre) workers.
鈥淪chools are a key part of our intervention as a recognised platform for social change, so we envisage that schools 鈥� where communities come together, teachers are respected and children can be change agents even in the homes 鈥� can be a forum to enhance existing platforms of community health delivery such as the Anganwadi centres,鈥� said Professor Lakhanpaul.
The intervention package, which covers strategies for households, communities, health and education organisations and government, includes teaching people about feeding practices and nutrition for a child鈥檚 first 1,001 days and links to infections, hygiene and sanitation guidance such as hand-washing, as well as solid waste management.
Project workers will also discuss with families how they interact with their children as part of feeding them, highlighting the importance of spending time with the children, as infancy is a vital period for learning and brain development. Time available to mothers was particularly recognised as a restricted resource.
The research team has also mapped out everything that needs to happen for effective implementation and operation of their strategy, which includes policy recommendations and cheaper or more readily available alternatives when necessary.
The next stage of the project will be to test out the effectiveness of their intervention.
The researchers add that both the research evidence and community-led intervention package have immediate relevance and application for the Indian Government鈥檚 POSHAN Mission to improve maternal and child nutrition, specifically to its convergence plans for each level.
鈥淭ackling the problem of undernutrition requires cross-sectoral and context-specific interventions. The PANChSHEEEL study has been unique as it has not only collected information on both nutrition specific and nutrition sensitive factors, but also utilised the information effectively for developing the intervention package working together with the community. The emerging design is extremely relevant in the context of POSHAN Mission,鈥� said Dr Rajesh Khanna (Save the Children, India).
香港六合彩中特网 is deepening its partnership commitments in India, so this project features on a visit to the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi (IIT-Delhi) by a delegation led by 香港六合彩中特网 President & Provost, Professor Michael Arthur, on February 21.
The following week, the researchers will be presenting their findings at conferences hosted by IIT-Delhi and Save the Children (in Jaipur) on February 26 and 28 which will be attended by Indian Government officials.
The 香港六合彩中特网 researchers are also learning from their work in India to improve health systems in the UK.
Media contact
Chris Lane, 香港六合彩中特网 Media Relations
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