THE Caloocan City government has garnered the distinction with the ‘Most Improved Nutrition Program Management’ which was awarded recently by the National Nutrition Council of the Department of Health.
This is due to the complete overhaul of the city’s nutrition programs by Mayor Oca Malapitan in 2013. The mayor has expressed enthusiasm after being informed of the award, saying “this is the fruit of our ‘Tao ang Una’ or people-first policy, and we will work harder to completely eliminate malnutrition.”
The limited human resource for nutrition both at the city and barangay levels proved to be challenging in implementing the Philippine Plan of Action for Nutrition. In 2014, the city had the lowest percent coverage of children weighed and measured during the Operation Timbang Plus among all the LGUs in Metro Manila.
What was even more alarming then was that city ranked 5th and 3rd among the 17 LGUs based on their prevalence of underweight and overweight, respectively. A clear indication of the presence of a double burden of malnutrition in the city.
In response to these nutrition challenges, Malapitan re-organized and revitalized the city nutrition committee through an Executive Order “Reorganizing the CNC and Organizing the City Nutrition Cluster with its new members and designating his wife, Mrs. Edna R. Malapitan, as the City Nutrition officer.”
This became a beacon of hope to the city. The CNC became active and functional, regularly meeting to discuss how to implement their nutrition programs better to reduce both under and over-nutrition. An inter-agency local planning core group was organized and tasked to plan a comprehensive nutrition program using the PPAN as the framework for action.
Challenged by the results of the Monitoring and Evaluation of Local Level Plan Implementation (MELLP) in 2015 and true to its “People First” policy, Caloocan hired an additional 233 Job Orders of Barangay Nutrition Scholars. A total of 247 BNSs were deployed in the barangays covering 44 health centers. Public-private partnership was strengthened in the schools and barangays that brought additional resources to the city nutrition program. The implementation of the Maternal, Newborn, Child Health Nutrition program was intensified.
A city nutrition program coordinator was given a seat in the Local Health Board Secretariat that paved the way for nutrition issues and concerns to be discussed and acted on by the board.
The good working relationship among the CNC members, particularly the Department of Interior and Local Government, Liga ng Barangay and the City Council led by its doubly hardworking and competent presiding officer Vice Mayor Maca Asistio III facilitated the passage of local ordinances and resolutions in the nutrition program.
Slowly but surely, Caloocan’s CNC is moving forward in the implementation of PPAN with their chair, Mayor Malapitan, providing the leadership and direction. GOOD RIDDANCE/ARLIE CALALO
