By Asmau Ahmad
The Civil Society Scaling-Up Nutrition in Nigeria (CS-SUNN), hascommenced a five-day capacity training for 30 Civil Society Organisations in Kaduna State, to push forgovernment scale-up nutrition intervention in the state.
The groups Acting Project Officer, Mr. Okoronko Sunday, said at the opening of the training in Zaria that it was meant to support government and other stakeholders to address current malnutrition crises in the state.
Mr. Sunday said that the training would equip the beneficiaries with the needed skills to advocate for timely release of funds for nutrition interventions and effective ways to monitor implementation in the state.
He described the group as a non-profit coalition of organizations with a vision to transform Nigeria into a country where every citizen has nutritious food.
The project officer said that the training is being conducted in partnership with Advocacy on Child and Family Health (PACFaH), which is currently implementing social accountability project by building capacity of indigenous CSOs and activists working on nutrition.
The officer said that the project was to catalyze government at national and state levels to fulfill commitments on child and family health to ensure sustainable growth and development.
“To support the mandate of the PACFaH project to build the capacity of CSOs in Nassarawa, Niger and Kaduna states, a need assessment was carried out early 2016 and gaps were identified that needed to be addressed.
“The gaps include organisational development, monitoring and evaluation, financial management, proposal writing and work plans for nutrition programmes among others.
“The training was, therefore, designed to address these gaps and equip CSOs with the basic skills to advocate for timely release of funds for nutrition activities in Kaduna State,” Sunday said.
It was reported that the Nigeria Demographic Health Survey 2013 indicates that 912, 822 children, representing 57 per cent of children in the state are stunted.
This means that six out of every 10 children less than five years in the state are stunted due to chronic malnutrition.
The survey also indicates that more than 750, 000, representing 42 per cent of children less than five years old, had severe acute malnutrition and were 10 times more likely to die.
