KARACHI (ENNS) EU’s Programme for Improved Nutrition in Sindh (PINS) organized one-day training workshop for all the officials of the Women Development Department (WDD), Government of Sindh.
The purpose of this workshop was to orient the audience on matters related to Nutrition and its management including the role to be played at the district level, for informing planning and decision making on nutrition, using a gender lens.
Alia Shahid, Secretary of the WDD, GoS in her opening remarks thanked EUs PINS1 for initiating the sensitization training, and urged the participants to take this learning to the field and play an effective role, at the service delivery level. She elaborated on the envisaged role of inter-coordination on Nutrition, through interacting and providing inputs to the district authorities mainly across the 8 line departments / sectors (Education, Agriculture, Health, Population Welfare, WASH, Livestock and Fisheries) in decision making on nutrition related matters, essentially to increase female participation in the process and make efforts with the communities to take the benefit to more number of females across.
Muhammad Zeeshan Tariq, Chief Adviser / Team Leader of PINS1/programme, thanked the Secretary for her role in materializing the concept and for taking this forward, he thanked and appreciated the WDD officials for their participation, as many of them had come from remote districts. He said that the purpose of the training is to build the capacity of the WDD officials/participants for effectively playing their roles at the district and sub-divisional levels and including the coordination forums for nutritional activities, such as the District Coordination Committees on Nutrition (DCCNs) and Sub-Divisional Coordination Committees on Nutrition (SCCNs) and trigger the efforts of the GoS and donors / development partners, for achieving the SDG target 2.2 ‘to end all sorts of malnutrition by 2030’ (SDG # 2 – Zero Hunger).
He expressed his hope that once equipped with the understanding on nutrition and its management, the WDD officials will be able to sensitize the communities and authorities on related aspects, particularly around gender and that they will be able to refer the SAM & MAM children (and their parents) to the OTP and Nutrition Stabilization Centres.
Dr. Sahib Jaan Badar elaborated upon the matters related to the nutrition-specific domain including presenting the data on SAM and MAM, district targets and achievements and the health facilities being established across the province for improving the status of nutrition, including OTP and NSCs, while elaborating to the nutritional needs of the children.
Dr. Farhana Shahid, Sr. Consultant, PINS1 who facilitated the workshop, deliberated upon with the participants on various nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive matters, including showing video documentaries and involving the participants in role playing and presenting/developing their thoughts around an active role to be played for improved nutrition management using the gender lens and particularly at the service delivery/community levels.
The issue of nutrition is critical in the province, Accelerated Action Plan, GoS, aims to reduce stunting 30% by 2021 and further 15% by 2026, with support of multiple partners, GoS, Donors and Development Partners. For this, the European Union has funded around 60 million euros for supporting the Government of Sindh in successful implementation of the Accelerated Action Plan through three components- policy development and capacity building (PINS1), nutrition specific (PINS2) and Nutrition sensitive (PINS3) components.
