Health
Women groups laud association for addressing malnutrition in Gombe
Women groups in Shongom Local Government Area of Gombe State have commended Sasakawa Association Africa (SAA) for the improvement of nutritional status of women on the country.
They said the training organied on how to use the local food produced within the communities for women had yeilded good results.
They stated this on Tuesday while sharing their experiences with journalists during the media field day, organised by SAA to access the activities of the project and the impact made on their communities.
Mrs Elizabeth Danlami, leader Kwada Multipurpose society Lalaipido Shongom LGA, said the crops cultivated through the advice of SAA had improved their nutritional status in the community.
“SAA has given us training on how to process the food we cultivate in various forms in order to balance our diet and now, our children are no longer malnourished.
“ As you can see, we have displayed some of the foods we made locally with high nutritional value which we use for our consumption as well as business purpose.
“ Apart from balancing our diet, the association empowered us, especially in the area of processing and marketing our produce, to be self-reliant,” she said.
Sharing her experience, Mrs Ladi Naphtali said she would forever remain grateful to the association for the training given to them in the area of child-spacing, exclusive breast feeding and production of baby food which containing all the nutrients needed for healthy growth.
” We do not buy baby food any longer in this community, instead we use the available crops we produced to prepare it.
“As you can see our babies are looking healthy; they even double their birth weight, this was a result of the nutrient contained in the food we locally made,” she said.
Naphtali stressed that even the pastoralists in the community could testify to how their nutritional status and that of their children had improved because due to the training for them.
Mrs. Ruth Bitrus, leader Mirmu Women Multipurpose Society Diga Community of Shongom LGA said Sassakawa had empowered women, especially in the area of processing and marketing of agricultural produce.
She also said SAA taught them how to process the food they produced in so many ways, to improve their nutritional status and their children.
“ Especially our children, they are growing healthy because their nutritional status has improved, we do not have cases of kwashiorkor and malnutrition in our community,” she said.
Bitrus said even their spouses were happy with them because of the way they now prepared their food.
” Women in my community are treated with dignity because they now have income to cater for their immediate needs and children,” she said.
In his remark Mr Isaac Eni, Technical Coordinator, Market Oriented Agriculture SAA, said the women communities that displayed the crops produced used organic means of production.
He said since fertiliser became expensive and scarce, they tried to substitute it with organic fertiliser such as animal manure.
“We have seen the various recipes they have produced which have to be with our nutritional-sensitive agriculture and also to get source of income.
“Our aim was to promote a good living among the communities we are intervening ,” he said.
NAN reports that highlights of the event included display of local foods with nutritional values prepared by the women groups.
Also a lecture was delivered by Mr Yahuza Yahaya, Technical Coordinator, Nutrition Sensitive Agriculture, on the six classes of food and their work in human body.
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