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Nutrition International and Government of the Philippines move forward with their national nutrition action plan collaboration
Nutrition International is continuing to collaborate with the Philippine government to deliver the Philippine Plan of Action for Nutrition (PPAN) 2017-2022.
Posted on November 2, 2017
Iloilo City, Philippines – Nutrition International, through its Nutrition Technical Assistance Mechanism (NTEAM)’s Technical Assistance for Nutrition (TAN) project, is continuing to collaborate with the Philippine government to deliver the Philippine Plan of Action for Nutrition (PPAN) 2017-2022. Led by the National Nutrition Council (NNC), the new nutrition plan provides a roadmap on how to address urgent nutritional challenges faced by the Philippines population.
The Philippines joined the Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) Movement in 2014, indicating its commitment to ending hunger and malnutrition in all its forms, and ensuring that each Filipino enjoys his or her right to good food and good nutrition. The nation hopes to further deliver on this commitment with the development of its new nutrition plan.
Since the official launch of the PPAN on May 2nd, Nutrition International was requested by the NNC to resume its technical assistance as part of the DFID-funded Technical Assistance for Nutrition (TAN) project. Over the next six months, Nutrition International technical assistance consultants will be supporting the NNC in scaling up its rice fortification and distribution programme within the Social Safety Net Programme (SSNP). This will be done through supporting the Philippine government’s ability to design national-level policy and programme guidance for scale up of rice fortification interventions, aiming to cover nearly four million families with supply of iron-fortified rice.
Nutrition International will also provide support to operationalize the PPAN and advance the national nutrition agenda in the Philippines for the next two years. Specific work to be assigned to Nutrition International consultants will include providing technical support for planning and delivering nutrition actions particularly at the regional level, support in strengthening monitoring and reporting mechanisms of nutrition actions, and help facilitating coordination between multi-sectoral, multi-stakeholder and SUN networks in order to build synergies for nutrition actions.
These assignments follow Nutrition International’s initial support to the development of the PPAN back in 2016. Through NTEAM’s TAN project, technical assistance consultants first collaborated with the NNC and UNICEF to complete a thorough nutrition landscape analysis of the Philippines, which involved extensive national and regional consultations with numerous stakeholders within the country. With these findings, the PPAN 2017-2022 was drafted to reflect local priorities, ambitions, and needs.
‘’The PPAN formulation was a good learning and re-learning experience as the team of consultants pursued the terms of the contract even in a very time-constrained context. We hope this is but a start of a fruitful working relationship with Nutrition International on the common goal of improving the nutritional situation of the country.’’
-Maria-Bernardita T. Flores, Assistant Secretary of Health and Executive Director of the NNC
Nutrition International looks forward to continue supporting the Philippines with technical assistance under TAN, as requested by the NNC.
About the PPAN
Despite rapid economic growth in recent years, many Filipinos still experience hunger, food insecurity, maternal and child undernutrition, especially in the first two years of a child’s life, stunting and wasting, deficiencies in vitamin A, iron and iodine, and many related health issues.
To address these challenges, the PPAN proposes 12 programs and 46 projects as a framework for actions to be undertaken by member agencies of the NNC, other national government agencies and local units, non-governmental organizations, academic institutions, and development partners, over a six-year period.
With the PPAN in place, the NNC hopes to improve the nutrition situation of the Philippines as a contribution to reducing both inequality in human development outcomes and child and maternal mortality. More specifically, the expected outcomes of the PPAN are to reduce wasting and stunting among children and micronutrient deficiencies, and to cease further increase in overweight children and adults.
About the TAN Project
Technical Assistance for Nutrition (TAN) is a project within Nutrition International’s Nutrition
Technical Assistance Mechanism (NTEAM) funded with UK aid from the UK government. Through
TAN, Nutrition International provides timely and coordinated technical assistance to help SUN
countries, the SUN Movement Secretariat and regional coordination bodies overcome gaps in
capacity, design and delivery of multi-sectoral national nutrition action plans. Taking a gendersensitive approach, Nutrition International works to enhance the quality, scale, and effectiveness of
nutrition-related programmes and policies. Through TAN, NTEAM’s extensive network of experts
contribute to global knowledge on effective technical assistance in nutrition by generating learning
and evidence, and adopting practice that works.
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