Project profile — Reducing Maternal and Child Undernutrition

• Ghana (100.00%)

• Basic Health: Basic nutrition (12240) (100.00%)

• Gender equality (significant objective)
• Environmental sustainability (cross-cutting) (significant objective)
• Participatory development and good governance (not targeted)
• Trade development (not targeted)
• Biodiversity (not targeted)
• Climate change mitigation (not targeted)
• Climate Change Adaptation (not targeted)
• Urban issues (not targeted)
• Desertification (not targeted)
• Children's issues (significant objective)
• Youth Issues (not targeted)
• Indigenous Issues (not targeted)
• Disability (not targeted)
• ICT as a tool for development (not targeted)

The goal of the project is to reduce illness and death due to undernutrition among children and mothers in northern Ghana. The project aims to increase the support available within communities for treating malnutrition and improving nutrition among the most vulnerable populations of northern Ghana. The project activities include training and equipping frontline health workers to treat severely malnourished children; training community volunteers to identify the early stages of severe acute malnutrition and to refer patients for treatment; training community volunteers and local organizations to promote local, nutritious foods; and providing information on good feeding practices for infants and young children. To ensure that the expanded support for nutrition is sustainable and to help reduce the number of children facing undernutrition in the long term, the project helps the Government of Ghana develop and implement a strong and coherent national nutrition policy. The project also includes developing a gender-sensitive nutrition surveillance system in the three northern regions, to help the government and development partners improve nutrition programs, decision-making, and timely response in those regions.

The expected intermediate outcomes for this project include: (1) improved treatment and prevention of undernutrition for boys and girls under five years of age and for mothers; (2) improved financial support, gender-sensitive policy coherence, and coordination in the nutrition sector; and (3) improved monitoring of nutritional indicators and improved decision making for better nutritional outcomes.

Results achieved as of the end of project (March 2017) include: (1) a reduction of stunting rates of the poorest quintile from 33% to 25%; (2) life-saving treatments were provided to 51,032 children –over 50% girls; (3) 458,200 mothers were reached with best practices and knowledge for nutritional feeding and related health behaviors; (4) 1,089,333 households were educated on proper nutrition; (5) the coverage of health care for children suffering from severe acute malnutrition was ensured in all 96 districts targeted by the project; (6) the number of districts with an infant death rate above 10% was reduced from 47 in 2013 to only 2 in 2016; (7) “change ambassadors” engaged communities in dialogue on child feeding and immunization, and discussions were broadcasted on the Coastal Television (CTV) network to an estimated 200,000 viewers; and (8) 2,797 health clinic staff working with mothers received training on promotion, support and protection of breastfeeding. These results have contributed to strengthening the Ghana Health Services’ national and sub-national capacity to prevent and treat malnutrition, to prevent child mortality and morbidity, and to increase the accessibility of quality health services for mothers and children.

• Proactive disclosure