The National Nutrition Council-Region III commended the Municipality of Talavera, Nueva Ecija and Mabalacat City of Pampanga Province for having their local ordinances initially uploaded in the portal of Compendium of Local Ordinances and Issuances on Nutrition launched during the 6th National Conference of Nutrition Action Officers on 1 October 2020.
The Compendium of Local Ordinances and Issuances on Nutrition (https://drive.google.com/drive/u/1/folders/1Pa_tFLvLfPqz9g-tVGGo5mzTmj6wlHu_) serves as a knowledge-sharing platform for local government units to learn from initiatives of local government units who have successfully harnessed the strength of policy instruments in scaling up nutrition. The project aims to widely disseminate actual examples of effective local policies on nutrition through the form of an electronic online compilation and a printed publication, that can be publiclty accessed and used as reference by local governments aspiring to improve their implementation of nutrition programs. The compendium is a project of the National Nutrition Council in partnership with the Nutrition Officers Association of the Philippines (NAOPA), with support from Nutrition International and UNICEF Philippines. (Source: www.nnc.gov.ph)
During the launch, 208 local ordinances and 45 executive orders were initially uploaded in the portal, which came from submission from provincial, city and municipal governments across the 17 regions of the country. The uploaded local ordinances and issuances in the portal have been selected based on four criteria, namely: Responsiveness, Coverage and Reach, Impact and Replicability. The selection was done by the NNC Regional Offices and the National Project Team composed of members from the NNC Central Office, NAOPA and the NTEAM TAN Providers.
Talavera Municipal Ordinance No. 15-2019 is an Ordinance Creating a Food Bank in the Municipality of Talavera providing Guidance for the Donation, Operation, Storage and Distribution of Healthy and Nutritious Cooked Meals to Less Fortunate Members of the Community in the Municipality of Talavera. The ordinance was classified under the food security thematic cluster wherein the MunicipaL Nutrition Committee members generate resources and engage private establishment and individuals to take part in the nutrition programs.
The cluster on Food Security includes ordinances that ensure that people at all times, have physical, social, and economic access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food that meets their food preferences and dietary needs for an active and healthy life. Ordinances around food production including household and community food gardens, livelihood, and employment generation in the communities along with similar ordinances are part of this cluster. Many of these projects are considered under the Nutrition-sensitive Program of the PPAN 2017-2022.
Mabalacat City Ordinance No. 26, Series of 2020 001 is an Ordinance Approving the Revised Comprehensive Welfare Code for Children in the City of Mabalacat, Pampanga. The ordinance was included as thematic cluster Code.
By definition, codes have been enacted by local governments to provide a comprehensive guiding reference to various instrumentalities of local government and the constituency on broad development concerns within the LGU such as health, children’s rights and welfare, and gender and development. Nutrition as a multisectoral concern has been built into these various codes which has facilitated effective implementation of nutrition programs, projects, and activities in the LGU.
Key features of Mabalacat City’s ordinance was the inclusion of the key provisions of Republic Act 11148 “An Act Scaling up the National and Local Health and Nutrition Programs through a Strengthened Integrated Strategy for Maternal, Neonatal, Child Health and Nutrition in the First One Thousand (1,000) Days of Life” or otherwise known as the “Kalusugan at Nutrisyon ng Mag-Nanay Act”.
Both Talavera, Nueva Ecija and Mabalcat City are recipients of the Consistent Outstanding Winners in Nutrition (CROWN) First Maintenance Awards in 2018.
