Cebu City – The National Nutrition Council Region VII urged families especially beneficiaries of Pantawid Pamilya program to grow kitchen gardens in their homes.
The growing of home kitchen gardens was agreed during the recently concluded Regional Advisory Council meeting held at the DSWD 7 Conference Room, Cebu City. Dr. Parolita A. Mission, Nutrition Program Coordinator of the National Nutrition Council 7 made the proposal as a transition for the phase out of the Pantawid Pamilya program. ARD Nemia Antipala of DSWD 7 said that “this is one of the life skills that these families ought to have especially those in the Phase 1 which will have the government support until December 2013”.
Kitchen garden is a form of home garden where families grow small plots of vegetables to provide fresh produce for their own consumption. Kitchen gardens also improve users' health through increased fresh vegetable consumption, providing a venue for exercise and opportunity for family bonding. The technology will be taught by the city/municipal agriculturist during family development sessions and monitored by the city/municipal links.
The Pantawid Pamilya Program is a national government program managed by the Department of Social Welfare and Development that invests in the health and education of poor households, particularly of children aged 0-14 years old. Patterned after the conditional cash transfer scheme implemented in other developing countries, the Pantawid Pamilya program provides cash grants to beneficiaries provided that they comply the conditions. The program has dual objectives: Social Assistance to provide cash assistance to the poor to alleviate their immediate need (short term poverty alleviation); and Social Development to break the intergenerational poverty cycle through investments in human capital.
// Beverly Saban, CTU DevCom Intern
