The National Nutrition Council XI recently conducted a joint regional meeting for the Early Childhood Care and Development in the First 1000 Days (ECCD-F1K) Program attended by the Nutrition Action Officers of Davao del Sur and Davao Occidental, and participated by the Regional Nutrition Evaluation Team (RNET) of Region XI held last May 23, 2018 at The Pinnacle Hotel and Suites, Sta. Ana Ave. Davao City.
The meeting was held to provide guidelines for Home Food Production and Local Media Planning reported by Dr. Maria Teresa L. Ungson, to orient participants about Training and Communication Components, Technical Assistance, Monitoring & Evaluation (TAME) tackled by NO III Retsebeth Laquihon, Program Fund Management and Procurement Process discussed by AA VI Maria Liza Salvador for ECCD F1K Program and to discuss its updates and status as reported by the Nutrition Action Officers of Davao del Sur namely: Raffie Redoblado-Municipal Nutrition Action Officer of Magsaysay, Corazon Dino- Provincial Nutritionist Dietitian II of Davao del Sur, and Teresita Tapere-Municipal Nutrition Action Officer of Hagonoy.
In her welcome remark, Dr. Maria Teresa L. Ungson, Regional Nutrition Program Coordinator of NNC XI, stressed that “Giving the best (breastmilk) to your child is to produce quality citizens for our nation “, adding that the ECCD F1K Program of NNC aims to address primarily “stunting” among children as based on the survey of the Food and Nutrition Research Institute or FNRI in 2015 stating that about one-third of our children under-five years old were stunted. This translates to about 4.6 million Filipino children.
Last 2016, Digos City, and the municipalities of Magsaysay and Hagonoy, Davao del Sur were chosen as 3 of the pilot areas to implement ECCD F1K Program and the municipalities of Malita, Don Marcelino, Jose Abad Santos, Sta. Maria, and Sarangani of Davao Occidental was included in 2017. This aims to contribute in addressing the problem of stunting in the country as the PPAN 2017-2022 is targeting an 8 % decrease of stunting among children below 5 years old from 33.4% to 21.4% translating to about 4.6 million to 3.3 million children by the year 2022.
