Talibon, Bohol – The Regional Nutrition Cluster of Central Visayas commended the Municipal Nutrition Cluster of Talibon, Bohol during its visit to the area on 21 September 2022 as part of its monitoring and evaluation of nutrition clusters in Central Visayas. The monitoring of these clusters aims to help Local Government Units operationalize the Nutrition in Emergencies (NiE) program under the Philippine Plan of Action for Nutrition (PPAN) 2017-2022, and its successor PPAN 2023-2028.

The nutrition Cluster which is a sub-cluster of the Health Cluster of the Disaster Risk Reduction Management Cluster is composed of partner agencies from government, and non-government organizations that guides the implementation and monitoring of programmatic measure to reduce nutrition-related mortality and morbidity because of emergencies (like COVID-19) and disaster’s impact on public health, economy, and social aspect.

As there will be no shortage of natural disasters around Central Visayas, the effort to monitor and evaluate will help empower the Local Nutrition Committees to become resilient in the face of disasters or emergencies.

Although there were some areas where the LNC of Talibon, Bohol needed to step up like their DRRM plan, information management system, and new DRRM plan in coordination with the disaster response team, an active and efficient nutrition cluster will help ensure the affected population in the event of a calamity will be prepared in the prevention of worsening malnutrition.

Nevertheless, Talibon, Bohol remains to be one of the most efficient and effective when it comes to their implementation of nutrition programs, and they have yet to reach their full potential, especially in Nutrition in Emergencies. // DMO II Gab Flores, RND