This project is part of the advocacy activities of We Care project.
Good Nutrition for a better future project is developed by Working Group (WG) “Healthy nutrition for a better future”. The goal of this WG is to advocate to increase the opportunity for ensuring equal access to healthy nutrition for all children regardless of the remoteness of their place of residence and the socio- economic status of their parents. The data shows that children from vulnerable communities are with limited access to healthy nutrition. The existing ECD services does not provide information and nutritional support for those that are most excluded such as Roma, families with low incomes, families, living in segregated areas. The project aims at development of a proposal for national targeted program in support of nutrition for vulnerable children aged 0 to 3.
The WG has developed a comprehensive advocacy strategy and the current project will be the practical implementation of the developed advocacy strategy.
The current advocacy strategy addresses the inequality and the deficits in the policies aimed at ensuring the healthy nutrition of children nutrition as well as at providing every child with food appropriate for his/ her age – a right of every child that has been regulated in Ordinance No.1 (22 January 2018) of the Ministry of Health (MH) on physiological norms for nutrition of the population.
The aim of the advocacy strategy is to increase the opportunity for ensuring equal access to healthy nutrition for all children regardless of the remoteness of their place of residence and the socio-economic status of their parents, namely by the state's commitment to support the identification of children’s needs and to provide them with nutrition appropriate for their age.
The “Good Nutrition for a Good Future” aims at initiating a public debate on the nutrition of children, especially children from vulnerable groups, by creating a space where individual stakeholders (institutions, civil society organizations, social service providers, medical and early childhood development professionals, nutritionists, researchers, policymakers and experts) can meet and have discussions. An important element of the strategy we propose has to do with the opportunity it provides for hearing the voice of parents from vulnerable groups (through focus groups and in-depth interviews), and learning more about the difficulties they have and challenges they face in raising children.
The project is structured with the following work packages (WP):
- WP “Project Management”: leading organization: “HESED”;
- WP “Research for evidence-based advocacy”: leading organization “HESED”;
- WP “Communication Strategy”: leading organization “Knowledge Association”;
- WP “Advocacy, coalition building and partnership”: leading organization “Future for the Children” Association