Dr. Eadara Shrikanth, TAN Asia Project Manager and Dr. Sahota Rupinder, Project Officer from Nutrition International - Technical Assistance for Nutrition (NI-TAN) conducted the progress assessment in relation to the project “Support to Scaling up Rice Fortification and Distribution with the Social Safety Net Program (SSNP) in the Philippines”. This project started on August 2017 – February 2018 and aims to support the National Nutrition Council (NNC) in scaling up rice fortification programme under the SSNP in the Philippines. This Technical Assistance by the Nutrition International is expected to bring a significant contribution to the Philippines government’s ability to design the national level policy and programme guidance for scale up of rice fortification intervention.

The progress assessment conducted last February 24, 2020 at the Provincial Government Office, Province of Davao de Oro was participated by Davao de Oro’s iRice task force composed of different agencies namely NFA, DepEd, Gawad Kalinga-kusina ng kalinga, PLGU, PHO, DOST, SP, DTI, and PNC. The assessment focused on what had emerged after the technical assistance, the problems and challenges faced, and the future plans for the food fortification program in the province.

Some of the challenges encountered by the Province of Davao de Oro were lack of manpower from the nutrition office as well as the marketing strategies in adopting the iron fortified rice for public consumption. Also, there is only 1 supplier available in the province that could provide iron fortified rice. However, the Province had supported the Gawad Kalinga – Kusina ng Kalinga program for the feeding of school children in coordination with the Department of Education – Davao de Oro Division. The program was called Bayanihan Para sa Kalusugan-Kusina ng Kalinga" (BPSK-KNK) and it was successfully implemented throughout 11 municipalities in the province. This program fed 7,742 school children in 325 public elementary schools, providing one hot nutritious meal every school day and uses iron fortified rice and fresh ingredients from the market and vegetables from the Gulayan sa Paaralan Program.

Last February 20, 2017, Davao de Oro Gov. Jayvee Tyron Uy received the award as one of the 7 finalists during the first Benita and Catalino Yap Foundation (BCYF) innovation awards in Malacañang Palace. The province of Davao de Oro secured 2nd place in Government Service Category positioning rice fortification as their main innovation. By September 2017, a joint project by the PLGU Davao de Oro, DOST XI, and FNRI called the COMVAL iRice was the recipient of the Pag Asa Award from the Civil Service Commission and was received by Gov Uy. This joint project aims to address the problem of iron deficiency anemia among school children. Comval iRice is a pro-poor innovation that has improved the nutrition status of many severely wasted and wasted school children proven after the evaluation conducted for BPSK-KnK Program. The Province of Davao de Oro wants to continue its flagship program and plans to reactivate their iRice Task Force to carry on their innovation, coordination and commitment in using Iron Fortified Rice to end hunger and achieving zero (0) malnutrition in the province. MTLU/MKBL