Project profile — Prevention of Childhood Undernutrition

• Mali (48.33%)
• Senegal (22.23%)
• Burkina Faso (29.44%)

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

• Gender equality (significant objective)
• Environmental sustainability (cross-cutting) (not targeted)
• 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 (principal objective)
• Youth Issues (principal objective)
• Indigenous Issues (not targeted)
• Disability (not targeted)
• ICT as a tool for development (not targeted)
• Nutrition (principal objective)
• Disaster Risk Reduction(DRR) (not targeted)

This project seeks to improve the well-being and survival of children by improving the delivery of direct nutrition interventions. The project also aims to document lessons learned to inform nutrition-related policy and program practice at national and global levels. The project aims to: (i) use behaviour change communication programs to promote optimal infant and young child feeding practices; and (ii) provide access to nutritional products, such as fortified foods, to help food-insecure households supplement the diets of their young children in order to provide adequate nutrition. The project aims to combine these nutrition interventions with existing outreach programs in the health sector in order to generate useful knowledge on how to effectively integrate different health-related activities. This project also seeks to generate knowledge to inform and guide global, regional, and national policies to scale up nutrition, and contribute to developing best practices for programming focused on treating for severe acute malnutrition.

The expected intermediate outcomes for this project include: (i) improved uptake of community-based management of acute malnutrition services through enhanced screening and referral; (ii) reduced incidence of acute and chronic malnutrition; and (iii) increased use of evidence on feasibility, effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of integrated prevention and treatment programs to design improved policies and to scale up programs to tackle acute and chronic undernutrition in infants and young children.

Results as of the end of the project (December 2017) include: (1) the percentage of children (between the ages of 6 to 8 months) who consumed solid, semi-solid, or soft foods during the previous 24 hours increased by 19% in all three countries (Mali, Senegal and Burkina Faso); (2) over 33,000 cartons of small-quantity lipid-based nutrient supplements (SQ-LNS) were delivered to health centres over project life; (3) 55% of eligible children consumed the appropriate amount of SQ-LNS in the three days prior to measurement; (4) more than 72,000 infants and young children received monthly small-quantity lipid-based nutrient supplements; (5) more than 1.2 million screenings for acute malnutrition were conducted in infants and young children (between the ages of 6 to 59 months), compared to the target of 1 million at the beginning of the project; (6) 81% of infants and young children with acute malnutrition were treated over the intervention period; (7) more than 4,200 individuals were trained in behaviour control communications for essential nutrition actions and/or SQ-LNS; (8) more than 100,000 caregivers received educational messages about child nutrition; and (9) 10,142 cases of malnutrition were averted among the children who participated in interventions compared to the control group. This project has led to increased nutritional intake among beneficiaries, has demonstrated the value of SQ-LNS provision, and has reinforced best practices in the community-based management of acute malnutrition.

• Proactive disclosure