Nutrition plays an important role in both mental and physical health of Individuals. Women in particular face issues such as malnutrition, lack of maternal health, disregard for mental health, breast cancer, and domestic violence among others. In most developing nations, women’s health and nutrition topics are deprioritized over those of male members of the household. Malnutrition would often result in ill health and reduction of the ability to work and thus economic losses for the families and communities. The sample project is aims to improve the overall health status of adolescent girls and develop their knowledge on nutrition, health, menstrual hygiene and development. Through the project the implementing agency will be demonstrating the importance of a healthy diet and shall also promote the adoption of hygienic menstrual practices in the project area.
Grant Proposal
Purpose/summary of the proposal (maximum 50 words)
The proposed project aims to improve the overall health status of adolescent girls in the Philippines. The project would reduce anaemia in adolescent girls and improve their knowledge on nutrition, health, menstrual hygiene and development. Through the project our teams will be demonstrating the importance of a healthy diet and shall also promote the adoption of hygienic menstrual practices.
Target Area and beneficiaries/stakeholders
The project shall be implemented in the Philippines and will be directly benefiting over 5000 adolescent girls.
Total budget requested and duration (Brief information of what will be done during the duration)
The project will be implemented over a period of 2 years.
The project will start by undertaking a detailed baseline study, so as to collect background information related to the status of nutrition and menstrual hygiene amongst adolescent girls. The second step of the project will be development of suitable communication materials. Awareness sessions for adolescent girls and their parents will be conducted once the communication collaterals are ready for circulation.
To enhance the participation of adolescent girls in the project, we shall mobilise girls and form adolescent health clubs to provide them a safe and comfortable place where they can discuss various issues and also develop better understanding on nutrition and health.
Project background: (The reason for why the problem needs attention.)
Adolescents – defined by the United Nations as those between the ages of 10 and 19 – number 1.2 billion in the world today, making up 16 per cent of the world’s population (UNICEF, 2019). Adolescence refers to a transitional stage of physical and psychological development that generally occurs during the period from puberty to legal adulthood. Adolescence is a period during which children undergo significant physical growth and sexual maturation. Nutrition plays an important role during this transition period as it determines the overall growth of the adolescents. Studies suggest that inadequate nutrition during adolescence may lead to severe health issues during adulthood and may impair the productivity of people.
Nutrition plays an important role in both mental and physical health of Individuals. Women in particular face issues such as malnutrition, lack of maternal health, disregard for mental health, breast cancer, and domestic violence among others. In most developing nations, women’s health and nutrition topics are deprioritized over those of male members of the household. Malnutrition would often result in ill health and reduction of the ability to work and thus economic losses for the families and communities. These impacts can be felt over the entire life of an individual and especially in adolescent women once they reach the child bearing age. The effect could cascade over next few generations as well causing health related issues to be prevalent in families. Some of the causes that result in poor health and poor nutrition status of adolescent girls in developing countries can be attributed to the following causes:
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- Lack of knowledge in the family and community about the importance of nutrition during adolescence
- Lack of food because of socio-economic circumstances
- Inequitable distribution of food in the family wherein girls being denied nutritious food
- Poor dietary intake of food and vegetables rich in iron
- Poor bioavailability of iron in the diet
- Poor sanitation
- Hookworm infestation
- Diseases like Malaria
- Bad cooking habits (over boiling vegetables and straining water, removing husk from wheat, eating polished rice and straining rice water, etc.)
Adolescent girls in the Philippines also face similar problems related to health and Nutrition, the Department of Health, Republic of Philippines, suggest the following statistics pertaining to Adolescents in the Philippines:
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- Sixteen percent (16.6%) of women age 15-19 have experienced physical violence at least once in their life and 4.4% are survivors of sexual violence.
- 6.8% of adolescents are current smokers and 5.7% are former smokers.
- Over 12.4% of adolescents are wasted and 8.3% overweight or obese.
- 42.2% consume soft drinks one or more times per day
- Only 13.9% adolescents were physically active for a total of at least 60 minutes daily on five or more days during the past week.
- Close to 37.2% pregnant adolescents are nutritionally at risk.
Towards tackling the above mentioned problems, there is a need to initiate a proper nutrition and health care improvement program, to ensure a balanced growth in society in large. Their wellbeing impacts the lives of their children and families.
Proposed Idea (Please state the main idea of the proposal, including the goal towards which it will contribute)
The proposed project aims to improve the overall health status of adolescent girls in the Philippines. The project would reduce anaemia in adolescent girls and improve their knowledge on nutrition, health, menstrual hygiene and development. Through the project our teams will be demonstrating the importance of a healthy diet and shall also promote the adoption of hygienic menstrual practices. We shall be engaging schools and local authorities for the project to yield long term impacts and be sustainable.
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- Objective 1. To improve the status of health and nutrition among adolescent girls in the Philippines.
- Objective 2. To promote adoption of good menstruation hygiene practices amongst adolescent girls.
Activity Plan (Please identify the main activities, and detail their sub-activities and timeframe.)
Baseline generation: Data on current level of health and nutrition status of adolescents will be collected in the identified project sites. Data will be collected through a set of PRA tools viz. Interview, Structured Interview, Focus Group Discussions, Questionnaire survey etc. Through the surveys and the FGDs we will gather both quantitative and qualitative data on adolescent health and nutrition status in the project site. Data related to the following parameters will be collected:
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- Total number of adolescents girls in the area
- School dropout rate amongst adolescent girls
- Reasons for dropping out of school
- Menstrual hygiene products available in the area
- Government run health care facilities
- Health facilities in the area
- Awareness on importance of nutrition
- Nutrition status of adolescent girls
- Diet composition and eating habits
- Health issues (deficiency, weight, height)
Development of communication material and toolkits: Comprehensive material on health and nutrition for adolescents will be developed in the form of training tool kits, leaflets, audio-video material and books. The training material will be used for distribution in schools and amongst parents. All the material will be developed in vernacular language which is easy to understand so as to engage with the local populace.
Developing health and nutrition profiles for adolescents in the selected villages: Towards developing better understanding of the dietary intake and choices of the adolescent girls, we shall be developing health and nutrition profiles of the project beneficiaries. Some of the details that will be documented in the adolescent profiles will include the following:
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- Nutrition Choice
- What are the frequently eaten foods for breakfast, lunch and dinner by the girls?
- Fruits and vegetables that are taken everyday.
- Consumption of unhealthy food items.
- Frequency of intake of milk and dairy products.
- Presence of micronutrients in food.
- Multivitamins, iron and calcium supplements taken by the target group.
- Menstrual Health related
- Menstrual practices being followed.
- Use of contraception
- Infant morbidity and mortality rates of children by age of mother
- Rates of alcohol and/or drug use connected with sexual activity among youth
- Usage of sanitary napkins, tampons, menstrual cups by the girls.
- Awareness on sexual and reproductive health
- Incidence of sexual abuse and violence
- Birth rates among young women, both unmarried and married
- Nutrition Choice
Awareness Generation: A mass awareness drive will be carried out in the project sites to sensitise the adolescent girls and their families on the importance of eating healthy and nutritious food and also on hygienic menstrual practices. Booklets, leaflets and flyers will also be distributed amongst school children, so as to engage them in the program. All the material published as part of the project will be distributed within the target communities. We shall also publish a series of comic books that will have short stories on various aspects of healthy food components, emotional and behavioral changes and menstrual hygiene.
Parents play a very important role in the upbringing of children, and therefore we shall conduct a parents awareness session. This will help in engaging the parents in a healthy discussion and letting them know about ways to counsel the children to eat healthy food and also adopt hygiene practices. During the awareness sessions we shall make them understand how local resources can be used to prepare healthy and nutritious food.
Establishment of Adolescent Girls Youth Clubs: Adolescent girls youth clubs will be established in the project sites. These clubs will be made specially for young girls from the towns and the members of the club shall come together and support each other. The centre will have a youth friendly environment, which would facilitate healthy discussions between the youth and they can clear their doubts. The main purpose of this club will be to initiate a healthy dialogue between the adolescents that visit it. Some of the activities that these clubs will carry out will include:
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- Special lecture series on the following topics:
- Nutritious food and its importance
- Harmful effects of teenage pregnancy
- Menstrual health and hygiene management
- Child sexual abuse
- Healthy recipes using local resources
- The following activities shall also being conducted under the Adolescent Girls Club:
- Formation of Girls Friendship Circle.
- Awareness session on menstrual health and hygiene.
- Celebration of monthly nutritious cooking competitions.
- Free sanitary napkin distribution to all the club members.
- Monthly documentary screening on empowering girls.
- Quiz on nutrition.
- Making posters on menstrual hygiene and the importance of nutritious meals.
- Special lecture series on the following topics:
Capacity building of schools and parents: A very essential component of the project is the engagement of schools in advocating the project. Our project team will meet with the school administration so as to discuss our project in detail. The ICT material will be shared with them and we will carry monthly sessions on nutrition and menstrual health. Also we will seek teachers’ support to work as counsellors and communicate with children about the problems they face.
For the project to yield long term impact, we shall train a few teachers on aspects of adolescent nutrition and health. Training sessions will be carried out by health experts and teachers will be given toolkits to develop skills to counsel and better understand the issues related to adolescent girls. Activities to be carried out in schools:
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- Weekly session on nutrition
- Weekly session on menstrual hygiene
- Distribution of sanitary pads
- Distribution of folic acid, iron pills, zinc capsule
