Nyamasheke: Parents urged to take responsibility to eradicate stunting

By Elias Hakizimana.

As Rwanda kicks off a special week for Maternal and Child Health under the theme “Hehe n’Igwingira”, in Nyamasheke district, the western province, parents were urged to dedicate time to prepare nutritious food for their children to eradicate stunting.

‘Hehe n’Igwingira’ literally translates as “No more Stunting “The campaign aims at eradicating stunting from pregnancy to birth, child nutrition, and related hygiene in diet preparation as well as child vaccination and ensuring that a child has got all the required vaccines.  

The official launch took place on Monday 27th November 2023 in Nyamasheke District, where observation showed lower efforts injected to eradicate the burden.

Rwanda has made tremendous efforts to improve maternal and child health in the country, but the Demographic and Health Survey 2019-2020 showed that Rwanda still bears a burden of neonatal mortality, infant mortality, under-five mortality, maternal mortality, and anemia among under-five children and mothers are dying from largely preventable causes.

However, with necessary vaccines, adequate nutrition, micronutrient supplementation, high uptake of family planning, and basic medical and maternal care, most of these young lives would be saved.

Joseph Desire Muhayeyezu, Ag. Mayor of Nyamasheke district points out parental irresponsibility to cater for children’s nutrition as they put forward their daily activities and ignore that children need to eat.

“Nyamasheke’s soil is very productive, and we have Isambaza from Lake Kivu, many parents from Karengera, Cyato, and other sectors are engaged in many activities and lack time to prepare food for children. They used to cook sweet potatoes and beans in the morning and go to work, imagine that children eat them cold the whole day, so food stuffs are available, but the problem is lack of knowledge of what to prepare and how to prepare it,” Muhayeyezu said.

He said that the district produces soja beans, beans, maize, and fish that can contribute towards reducing stunting but cites knowledge gap and ignorance of the parents.

Solution

“We plan to establish a kitchen at the village level to train parents to cook nutritious food for children, we will also involve other people who are considered as godfathers and godmothers to help us enforce the initiative,” Muhayeyezu said.

From 2018 until 2023, Rwanda reduced stunting from 38 to 33 percent, and in line with the National Strategic Transformation – NST1, the country targets to decrease stunting among children to 19 percent by 2024.

Assumpta INGABIRE, Director General of the National Child Development Agency (NCDA) told the media that some districts invest much effort while others are still going slow following the mindset of some parents and leaders.

“We will continue to mobilize the community especially parents to cater for 1000 days of children’s nutrition, ensuring breastfeeding for the first six months and continue to feed them with nutritious food to support breastfeeding. Parents here have access to fish, and we request them not to sell all the small-size fish from Lake Kivu, rather to first give to children,” Ingabire said.

During the week-long campaign, the Ministry of Health, NCDA, and other partners will be spreading necessary vaccines, adequate nutrition, micronutrient supplementation, high uptake of family planning, and basic medical and maternal care to save the lives of parents and children.

Aline Uwimana, an official from Rwanda Biomedical Centre in charge of Maternal and Child Health said that the country started such a campaign to fast-track the target of reducing stunting at 19 percent by next year 2024.

“It is vital to start from the pregnancy until the child is 2 years old, our efforts are very promising to meet the target by 2024,” Uwimana noted.

Parents in Nyamasheke district, they have a problem of lack of food and poverty as they have small arable land.

Jean NGENDAHIMANA, from Nganzo village, says that rural communities still face hunger as the major issue that causes stunting.

“The major problem we have is hunger, we request support from concerned authorities to first eradicate hunger, food is expensive, and we do not have enough land to cultivate,” he said.

Niyonsaba Semakuta, reiterates the same problem of hunger, noting that the arable land is not enough. “We grow beans, cassava, and sweet potatoes, we request the government to help us get enough land to grow enough food commodities,” Semakuta said.

Adela Mutuyimana, a mother of one child from Wimana cell, Ruharambuga sector in Nyamasheke district said that sometimes a child lacks parental care in nutrition.

“It is up to a parent to manage time for activities and to take care of the children, to cook and feed them, we need to change our mindset and working framework by putting forward the lives of children,” she said.

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