There had been a consistent decline in the level of malnutrition among Chhattisgarh’s children following the launch of the ‘Nava Jatan Programme’ by State Woman and Child Development Department claimed an official press release here on Thursday.
Going by the new set of parameters laid down by the World Health Organisation (WHO), malnutrition among children in Chhattisgarh as per the elaborate baseline survey conducted on June 6, 2012 stood at around 41 per cent.
Whereas, the statistics of 998 National Family Health Survey-II put the level of malnutrition in children at 61 per cent and the Survey-III in the same year puts the level to 52 per cent.
Notably, during the first phase of the survey conducted under ‘Nava Jatan Programme’, 35 per cent (7,036) of the targetted 20,033 malnurished children in the 340 selected villages reached normal levels of nutrition in a period of six to eight months with the efforts put in by NGOs, Self Help Groups (SHGs), Gram Panchayats, parents of children and women groups.
Officials of Woman and Child Development Department here informed that a total of 13 Gram panchayats in different districts have achieved the millennium development target on reducing the level of malnutrition.
As a result the malnutrition level in the children of these Gram panchayats had come down even below 30 per cent.
The panchayats where the nutrition levels had come down are Dashrangpur, Damgarh, Dullapur, Bamhani and Kishungarh in Kabirdham districts, Kasturpal and Belar in Bastar, Khamharia-01 and Utai in Durg, Balood in Dantewada, Hardua in Rajnandgaon and Nariyara in Janjgir-Champa .
The Gram panchayats with the most malnourished children were identified in various districts under the ‘Nava Jatan Programme’ and after making preparation of list, a baseline survey was conducted between April-May 2012. The entry of the results of the baseline survey was made in a specially prepared software for the ‘Nava Jatan Programme’.
The officials further informed that targets were assigned to 306 SHGs, 239 ‘Nutrition Friends’ and 51 NGOs for raising the level of nutrition in 20,000 malnurished children on the basis of the ‘Weight Fair’ held on June 6, 2012. The efforts of the various organizations who were assigned the target of bringing down the malnutrition levels , within a matter of six to eight months, brought more than 7,000 children out of malnutrition.
The results of National Family Health Survey-II (1998) and the Survey-III conducted in 2005-06 indicate that the rate of decline in malnutrition was averaging at one per cent per year while rate of malnutrition level under ‘Nava Jatan Programme’ with the efforts of the various organizations came down to one per cent in Chhattisgarh within a period of six to eight months.
During the aforesaid period, an estimated 3,000 severely malnourished children took advantage of the facilities of State’s ‘Nutrition Rehabilitation Centre’ while nearly one lakh children were provided healthcare services under ‘Mukya Mantri bal Sandharbha Yojana’ in Chhattisgarh.