In an emergency meeting of the Cagayan Valley Nutrition Action Officer Association, Cagayan Valley District/City/Municipal Nutrition Program Coordinators and Regional Nutrition Evaluation team held on 27 April 2021, the group agreed to reschedule the conduct of the Monitoring and Evaluation of Local Level Plan Implementation (MELLPI) Pro this year due to the surge of COVID-19 cases in the region.
The rescheduling of the MELLPI Pro came after the associations raised concerns during the special meeting conducted earlier this month. The associations raised the following concerns: the nutrition office and its staff are being utilized as personnel in the isolation facilities and vaccination sites, most of the members of the Local Nutrition Committees (LNC) particularly the Local Chief Executives (LCEs) and Nutrition Action Officers (LNAOs) are pre-occupied with the COVID-19 response and the on going vaccination. Most LNAOs of the region are Provincial/City/Municipal Health Officers and nurses. Many LNC members are working from home (WFH) because of the increasing cases in their offices and many Nutrition Officers, Nutritionist-Dietitians and Barangay Nutrition Scholars also got infected with or exposed to the COVID-19 virus and were either hospitalized, confined in isolation facility, or home-quarantined.
“In Isabela province most of our staff were quarantined and need to comply to the mandatory isolation protocols due to exposure and some had tested positive in COVID-19. The manpower of PNC is affected.” Shared by PNAO Henedina Cabrera during the emergency meeting.
RNET represented by NPC Maria Gisela M. Lonzaga understood the plea of LGUs and consider the proposed rescheduling of the MELLPI Pro this year.
“We are very much aware and understands the situation especially we are now experiencing surge in cases of COVID-19 in the region. I already informed these concerns earlier to NNC, central office”. expressed by NPC Maria Gisela M. Lonzaga.
The group agreed to submit BNS, NPCs and NAOs evaluation results by the provinces to NNC Region 02 on or before July 6, 2021 to give time to PNETs, MNETs and CNETs to evaluate the regional winners while MELLPI Pro results will be submitted on or before September 15, 2021.
All the provinces and cities of Region 02 were already awarded with Nutrition Honor Award, highest nutrition award in the country, hence they will self-evaluate their performance which will be validated by the RNET. LGUs will also be recognized for their efforts on COVID-19 response.
The MELLPI Pro is the monitoring and evaluation mechanism for the implementation of the Philippine Plan of Action for Nutrition (PPAN) at the local level, which is the country’s framework for nutrition improvement. It is done every year to assess the LGUs’ performance in local nutrition program implementation. ###JNLB
