Pasay City Mayor Emi Calixto-Rubiano expressed her support to the NCR Nutrition Shepherding Project during the courtesy visit of the members of the Regional Nutrition Shepherding Team (RNST) held on October 5, 2022.

Present during the visit were NNC-NCR Regional Nutrition Program Coordinator Milagros Elisa Federizo, Executive Director of Grace Family Helper Project Marlene Navarro who is also the Chair of RNST, Ms. Liza Ross Ferrancullo of MMDA and Team Leader for Pasay City, PopCom-NCR Assistant Regional Director Mary Jane Casimiro and Development Management Officer II Theresa Rivas of NNC-NCR.

The Nutrition Shepherding Project is part of the LGU mobilization program of the Philippine Plan of Action for Nutrition (PPAN) 2017-2022 that aims to transform priority areas nationwide to areas that deliver nutritional outcomes. In NCR, Pasay City is one of the priority areas of the project.

Mayor Calixto-Rubiano welcomed the project as part of the learning process of the City Nutrition Committee (CNC) to improve their implementation of nutrition programs aligned with the Philippine Plan of Action for Nutrition (PPAN). She designated City Nutrition Action Officer Dr. Maria Lourdes San Juan as lead of the project.

RNPC Federizo also provided the honorable Mayor with the copy of the Compendium of Actions on Nutrition. The compendium includes stories, key messages and lessons learned from the nutrition journey of the 11 outstanding local government units featured in the report. She hopes that Pasay City will be able to adopt some of the good practices featured in the compendium.

The team also had the opportunity to discuss with CNAO Dr. San Juan the report of the Regional Nutrition Evaluation Team on their findings during the Monitoring and Evaluation of Local Level Plan Implementation (MELLPI) visit held on August 9, 2022. The report includes the strong points, aspects of implementation which the City Nutrition Committee needs to improve, and recommendations. Taking off from the MELLPI results, next step is to reactivate the Pasay City Nutrition Council through a meeting on November 8, 2022 to be assisted by the RNST members.

Pasay City together with the cities of Caloocan, Manila and Quezon City are the identified priority areas of the Nutrition Shepherding Project in NCR through RNC Resolution No. 1 Series of 2020 “Declaring the New Priority areas of the Shepherding Project” (https://www.nnc.gov.ph/component/phocadownload/category/63-policies-plans-activities?download=2301:rnc-ncr-resolution-no-1-series-of-2020.

Written by: DMO II Theresa A. Rivas and NPC Milagros Elisa V. Federizo