Sustainability in the Nutrition program: the key step for people’s development

Empowerment refers to the ability of people to make decisions and control their own lives. In the field of health, empowerment involves giving people the tools and knowledge to take care of their health and that of their loved ones. 

Individual, family and community hygiene practices are essential to prevent diseases and improve general health. Empowering people to adopt and practice these measures helps improve individual and community health.

The members of the Board of Directors of the Fundación Juan Bautista Gutiérrez (FJBG), including its Vice President, Felipe Antonio Bosch Gutiérrez, have sought to promote these aspects through the Nutrition Program, an effort that focuses on the San Cristóbal Totonicapán municipality in the department of Totonicapán in Guatemala.

Its strategy has been to generate, through the promotion of Food and Nutrition Security, a long-term change impact by reducing the current levels of chronic malnutrition in Guatemala. 

The goal is to achieve this by transforming and strengthening behavioral skills and self-sufficiency of women and their families and, in addition, facilitating access to nutritious food by communities, as well as creating income through entrepreneurship.

The Sustainability Phase in the Nutrition Program

To accomplish these objectives, the program involves several phases: the Nutrition Phase, the Sustainability Phase, and the Entrepreneurship Phase. To reach this last phase it is necessary to build the first two steps, in which the moment sustainability is strengthened stands out. 

The Sustainability Phase involves collaboration with community leaders trained in previous phases of the program, who in turn provide follow-up to established practices through a combined face-to-face and virtual approach. This approach focuses on empowering individual, family and community hygiene practices that have already benefited 600 women and 220 children.

How has FJBG accomplished this? It has done it through 4 basic measures: 

• Face-to-face household visits

• Quarterly anthropometric measurements, Nutritional counseling and the supply of Nutribien.

• Use of audiovisual material (videos and counseling cards) shared through cell, router and LED screen technology.

• Quarterly presentation of results to community authorities by monitors.

In this way, FJBG continues to ensure Food and Nutrition Security, seeking to collaborate with communities to reduce current levels of chronic malnutrition, and to promote the improvement of skills and independence in the behavior of women and their families.