A group of around 20 women sit around Geni Mabelya with excitement. Using pictures and various utensils, she vividly explains what makes up a balanced diet. She then shows her audience how to grow, care for and harvest certain types of fruit and vegetables in a small garden and how to prepare the produce for different meals. You can tell that Geni knows her stuff and is experienced. And it's no wonder: since January 2021, she has been running the 'community healthcare project' in the Lindi region(Tanzania), which aims to reduce malnutrition there. Since then, she has been traveling around the region and has already taught almost 1000 women.
Tanzania still has a high number of undernourished and malnourished people in the population. This affects young children in particular, but also adolescents and women. With a rate of over 30% underweight people, 15 of the country's 26 regions are classified as 'very high' by UNICEF-WHO, including the Lindi region.
Malnutrition is considered to be one of the main causes of many other health complications. It also often exacerbates the symptoms of other infections, as the people affected have little or no physical resources to fight viral infections, for example.
Diese Situation war Grund genug das von Geni vorgeschlagene ‚community healthcare project‘ durch die Artemed Stiftung zu unterstützen. Es basiert auf den zwei Säulen der akuten klinischen Behandlung von schweren Fällen, sowie der präventiven Hilfe durch Aufklärung und Schulungen über gesunde Nahrung in der Bevölkerung. Weitere wichtige Lerninhalte sind Hinweise zum richtigen Stillverhalten, sowie das Einhalten von richtiger Hygiene. Ziel des Projektes ist es zunächst die Prozente der unterernährten Kinder (< 5 Jahre) von 25 % auf 10 % zu senken, sowie die Anzahl der stark untergewichtigen Kinder von 5 % auf 0 % zu reduzieren.
Important goals were already achieved in the first year of the project (2021). Over 1,000 children under the age of five were examined to identify malnutrition and maldevelopment. Underweight was diagnosed in 271 children and severe underweight in 54. With the help of the nutrition program, all 271 children were able to regain a normal weight. The 54 extreme cases were taken to hospital and treated there; 51 of them successfully.
In order to guarantee a healthy and balanced diet for these children in the long term and to ensure that there are no further cases, the education program was strongly promoted. In June 2022 alone, almost 70 people attended the workshops.
Since the start of the project, Geni has trained over 800 mothers and guardians in food and food preparation in more than seven villages. This is to be expanded even further in the future. On the one hand, more villages are to be included in the program, and on the other, a further focus is to be placed on growing their own fruit and vegetables from useful products: If the families are able to produce a large proportion of their own food, cost-intensive trips to markets and, of course, the cost of the produce itself are eliminated, which in turn improves the families' financial situation.
In the coming months, more emphasis will also be placed on allowing young women to take part in the workshops; the knowledge gained will not only directly combat the problem of malnutrition, but also strengthen the role of women in the family and society.
We look forward to continuing our collaboration and to seeing more pictures of Geni surrounded by interested viewers.
