BAGUIO CITY– Provincial Nutrition Action Officer, Dr. Mary Josephine Dulawan shared to nutrition stakeholders the best practices of local government unit of Ifugao in the field of nutrition during the regional launching of the Philippine Plan of Action for Nutrition (PPAN) 2017-2022 last year.
Dulawan bared that in the year 2004, they recognized that the province has high malnutrition rate in both stunting and wasting; nutrition committees were mostly not functional; no or inadequate funding for nutrition; no nutrition plans and no or weak monitoring for nutrition programs.
“With that scenario, we recognized that nutrition is one of fundamental elements of good governance so thru the leadership of the Governor then, we took actions. We conducted assessment, planned and implemented impact activities,”she shared.
They admitted that the functionality of the various nutrition committees from the provincial level, municipal and barangay levels has to be strengthened so they started working on it.
Another strategy is the formulation of a responsive Nutrition Action Plans at all levels from the provincial down to the barangays. Along with this is the institutionalization of the conduct of annual Monitoring and Evaluation of Local Level Plan Implementation (MELLPI) with feedback mechanism to all 11 Municipal LGUs. The Search for Outstanding Municipal Nutrition Committee/Barangay Nutrition Scholars (BNS)/Barangay Nutrition Committee (BNC) was also institutionalized.
Under health financing, Dulawan said they recognized that there were low investment for nutrition and so they facilitated the increase in local investment in nutrition by lobbying for the increase in revenue allotment for nutrition.
“We also strengthened our local and external outsourcing so we have Bethesda, SN Aboitiz and Hapag Asa as partners,” she added.
For human resource development support, Dulawan reported that Ifugao LGU provided capability building for BNS, as well as the provision of incentives for BNS and Nutrition Inception site in high performing areas.
As a result, based on the comparative nutritional status of combined severely and underweight preschool children from 2015-2017, the prevalence rate in 2015 was 2.01%, 1.81% in 2016 and 1.52% in 2017.
Among the milestones, Dulawan said Alfonso Lista Municipal Nutrition Committee received the Consistent Regional Outstanding Winner on Nutrition (CROWN) Award and is gunning for its second maintenance award.
Dulawan emphasized that among the key facilitating factors is the full support of chief executives in all health programs, designation of supportive Provincial/Municipal Nutrition Officers and sustained federated BNS, functional nutrition committees from provincial down to barangays, establishment of Provincial Nutrition Council Office with committed staff and established monitoring and evaluation system, among others.
She reported that the province has 11 functional Municipal Nutrition Committees, 185 Barangay Nutrition Committees, 191 active Barangay Nutrition Scholars and 804 Barangay Health Workers. **PIA CAR)
