Reinforcement of the team of female nutrition ambassadors

Femmes Ambassadrices de Nutrition – FAN

My name is BARANON Nadiath. I was born in 1985 and I am the mother of two children. I work as a farmer and have been appointed as one of the Female Nutrition Ambassadors (Femmes Ambassadrices de Nutrition or FAN) to fight malnutrition in my village through all kinds of activities.

Today, February 5, 2020, I took part in a training organised by the Hubi & Vinciane Foundation. The FAN’s learn how to do nutritional training and cooking demonstrations in collaboration with the community. We learn how how to identify the children from 6 months to 5 years who attend these sessions.

After attending the training, I have a lot of extra knowledge about malnutrition and how to fight malnutrition in children aged 6 months to 5 years. Among other things, I learned how to identify acute malnutrition using the arm circumference or the brachial perimeter. You measure the circumference of the child’s left arm with a three-coloured strip (green-yellow-red). Green indicates that the child has a good nutritional status. Yellow indicates that the screened child suffers “moderate” acute malnutrition. When it comes to the red colour, we are talking about a “severe” acute malnutrition.

I have also learned to prepare five different balanced meals:

• soy porridge enriched with powder from the moringa leaf
• porridge of fermented maize enriched with peanut paste
• porridge from fermented maize enriched with eggs
• puree of yam with red oil enriched with small ground fish
• sticky sauce enriched with small ground fish that can be served with different pasta’s

Thanks to this training, I feel sufficiently competent to supervise/coach nutritional training
sessions.