CEBU CITY, Cebu, June 23 (PIA) -- The National Nutrition Council Region7 (NNC7), as the policy making body on nutrition policies and strategies, has been focusing its efforts in implementing various food and nutrition security programs and activities aligned with its goal to address the issue of hunger and malnutrition and foster a food and nutrition secure community.

According to NNC7, one of the programs and policies that their agency has implemented is the Local Nutrition Early Warning System as part of their strategies to capacitate local government units (LGUs) in Central Visayas to take timely nutrition interventions through the early detection of a worsening nutrition situation based on the monitoring of nutrition and nutrition-related indicators.

NNC7 has also strengthened the implementation of the Local Nutrition Action Plan that seeks to deliver different food and nutrition services to ensure that families have access to affordable nutritious food.

“Kami sa NNC, we complement sa Department of Agriculture (DA)when it comes to advocating our food and nutrition security activities to ensure that our community is food and nutrition secure,” said Nasudi Soluta, nutrition officer III of NNC7, during the Kapihan sa PIA interview on June 22.

NNC7 has also implemented a dietary supplementation program dubbed “Tutok Kainan Program” which aims to improve the quality and quantity of food and nutrient intakes of beneficiaries by providing nutritious food commodities to pregnant women for 90 days and to children 6-23 months old for 180 days.

NNC’s food and nutrition program and services became a huge support in successfully reducing the hunger incidence from 14% during the peak of the pandemic in 2020 to 7.8% in the first quarter of 2022.

From this, the NNC7 vows to continue with the implementation of their programs as the issue of malnutrition still remains a big problem, especially among children.

Central Visayas logged a malnutrition rate of 2.4% equivalent to 72,000 malnourished children, based on NNC7 records. 

To effectively address the concern of undernutrition and overnutrition, NNC7 is aligning its policies and strategies in resolving issues of food security and accessibility, dietary supplementation, and access to health services which they considere as top factors that contribute to malnutrition. (RGC/PIA7)