Azafady - Project Votsotse
TRAID is working with the charity Azafady in the ongoing fight against malnutrition in Southern Madagascar.
The infant mortality rate in Madagascar is extremely high with 1 in 10 children dying before the age of five. A major contributing fact is poor nutritional health and practices, especially among pregnant women and nursing mothers.
Project Votosotse, an innovative collaboration between Azafady and CARE International, aims to transform nutritional practices in the region. TRAID is supporting the project with £17,322 to tour a mobile cinema around Madagascar showing education films raising awareness about good nutritional practices and health, and how to recognise malnutrition in young children.
Project Votsotse will establish nutrition committees to organise regular village discussion groups, meetings and house visits to circulate and promote better nutritional knowledge. Mothers will be able to monitor the growth of their children, and will learn how to improve the diet of their families through the cultivation and cooking of new foods. The mobile cinema will move between villages and will be a key tool in supporting this process.
In October 2008, two members of TRAID staff took part in a monitoring visit to Madagascar where they saw Project Votsotse in action. Enedina Columbano, Head of Retail and Operations, said,
"We visited the town of Ambossary in the Anosy region where the population suffers from high levels of malnutrition, and pregnant women and nursing mothers are the most affected. Project Votsotse had just completed its preparatory stage which included producing written and audio educational materials to distribute. We spent all day visiting villages where the poverty was extremely shocking. We were greeted by the Chief Cartier - the head of the village - and most of the village inhabitants. We met a young mother and mother to be, and listened to a song about the importance of breast feeding. Our visit took place on a mother and baby day, and we saw babies being weighed and their growth charted. Of our time spent with Azafady, this was the most rewarding visit because the project was already making a difference on the ground,and also the most emotionally draining."
Learn more about Azafady's work www.madagascar.co.uk
