Standard Project Report 2016
Story from the Field: Neon Tasi ' s First Steps
One-year-old Neon Tasi, whose name literally means " beach dreams ", struggled until recently to run on the nearby Lifau beach in his home district of Oecusse; he couldn’ t walk, and his tiny legs and arms could barely support his body.“ He was so thin, you wouldn’ t believe the difference now,” sad Sipri Oki, the family health volunteer who plays with him in his family’ s front yard. Like almost one in five children in Oecusse, Neon Tasi suffered from wasting, a kind of malnutrition where the child’ s weight is too low for his height. His 45-year-old mother, Franciska Oki, became concerned when she saw he wasn’ t growing.“ I heard that they had some special food with vitamins for kids who won’ t grow, so I took him to the clinic and the midwife said he was malnourished,” she explained.
At the clinic, a midwife who had been trained under WFP’ s nutrition programme counselled Franciska on how to feed her child properly, explaining that babies and young children need a variety of nutritious foods, including fruits, and sources of protein.“ She told me I had to feed my child healthy foods, such as rice porridge with vegetables, and also fruits,” said Franciska. Until she received counselling from the midwife, Franciska had not understood why her son was not growing despite feeding him store-bought milk formula. Despite having the perfect food items for babies, such as bananas and mangoes, growing in her front garden, she believed that they were bad for babies as they could cause stomach upsets.“ Before, we never used to feed him fruits, but now we give him bananas. And we buy eggs every few days,” Franciska said proudly.
In addition to being counselled as part of the nutrition programme, Neon Tasi was given a special nutritious peanut-based food to help him recover from malnutrition. Franciska can see huge changes in her child, and he has started walking with a stick as he continues building muscle strength.“ I’ m so happy to see him now that he can walk; in the mornings he uses a stick to walk around,” she said, adding that prior to treatment he could only crawl.
The nutrition programme, which was run by the Ministry of Health with support from WFP, operated in the six municipalities with the highest rates of malnutrition, and was funded by Korean International Cooperation Agency( KOICA) and the European Union. Across Timor-Leste, 11 percent of children suffer wasting, but Oecusse has the highest rates of wasting amongst children as well as high rates of malnutrition for women. Although malnutrition rates in Oecusse are very high, few parents realise that their child is suffering from malnutrition, or how to prevent it. In order to raise awareness of this issue, and in particular improve how parents and caregivers feed their babies and young children, WFP also supported local non-governmental organization( NGO), Alola, to establish mother support groups in all 18 of Oecusse’ s villages, with funding from KOICA.
In Nipani, Alola staff members talked to groups of would-be leaders for mother support groups. One woman asked how to respond when a mother comes to them saying they are having trouble breastfeeding or don’ t have enough milk for their baby.“ So what should you say, first you have to advise them about the ideal positions for breastfeeding, then you need to check whether the baby is attaching properly, and then ask how long they breast-feeding and how frequently." An Alola staff member then demonstrated with a doll, which is about the size of a newborn baby, how to hold a baby’ s head, back and bottom, so that it is comfortable for the mother.“ Every normal woman can feed her baby, and will produce a lot of milk if the position she breastfeeds in is correct,” she said. Both men and women were trained as mother support group leaders, because as another Alola staff member explained, men are influential in Timorese families, and can influence breastfeeding and infant feeding practices.“ It depends on their ability to talk to people, and enthusiasm,” he said.
Each group of suco leaders received training on breastfeeding after birth, good nutrition, feeding infants, birth planning, and post-birth care, as well as family planning. Afterwards WFP partners conducted house-to-house visits for new mothers and pregnant women, and established discussion groups with parents, grandmothers, aunts and even young people who might be taking care of small children.
Timor-Leste, Democratic Republic of( TL) 21 Development Project- 200770