Delivering Health, Nutrition and Livelihood, and Protection services for Rohingya Refugees and vulnerable host communities in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh
Goal:
Improving the health, safety, and well-being of women, men, boys, and girls in camps and surrounding host communities.
Objectives:
1. Improved health and nutrition practices for pregnant and lactating women (PLW) and children under 2 years and increased detection and rehabilitation of children affected by malnutrition related skeletal disorders (CWW & SARPV)
2. Improved access to nutritious food for households with children under 5, older persons, and PLW, through home gardens, participatory cooking sessions and livelihoods interventions (CWW & SARPV)
Geographical Coverage:
Haldiapalong and Ratnapalong of Ukhiya and 4,5,6,8W,10 (Camps with Nutrition Centers of SARPV) 13,14,15 (Camps with Nutrition Centers of Concern Worldwide, physiotherapists of SARPV provide service to the persons with disabilities in these camps, SARPV enumerator team will also conduct rickets survey in these camps)
Targeted Population:
i) Pregnant and lactating women (Women who have conceived and/or has a child less than 2 years of age)
ii) Husbands of pregnant and lactating women
iii) Mother-in-law of pregnant and lactating women
iv) Elderly people and their helpers: Elderly people aged more than 60 years are included in this group of beneficiaries.
Beneficiaries Coverage: 21,001
Funding Agency: Concern worldwide
Homestead Garden of a beneficiary
Achievement:
i. Formation of Mother Care Group (MCG), Household Care Group (HHCG), Husband’s group, Mother-in-law group and elderly group in all camps and unions of the project area.
ii. Conduction of four MCG monthly sessions on topics of group session facilitation technique, home garden, care before, during and after pregnancy and complementary feeding
iii. Conduction of one session of quarterly sessions of Husbands, mother-in-law and elderly on the topic of home gardening.
iv. Establishment of 19836 home garden
v. Establishment of 150 model gardens in total
vi. Training of 150 beneficiaries of host community on poultry rearing, small business and food processing (50 beneficiaries for each trade)
vii. Identification and management of 63 Rickets patients through providing calcium tablets in camps and host community.
viii. Enlistment of 54 persons with disabilities for providing assistive devices to them.
Identified Person with disability in different camps
Challenges:
• Due to delay in starting in the project activities, the team had to accomplish a huge volume of tasks within a short time. However, with the passage of time, this challenge has been mitigated.
• The team faced major challenges during the distribution of snacks and lunch among the session participants. There were crucial issues of delay in food delivery and inferior quality of food. Due to huge number of beneficiaries, the vendors had failed to meet the expected standard of food and timely delivery.
• Distribution of seeds and fertilizers were conducted separately and therefore the same beneficiary had to come twice for collecting the inputs. It was troublesome for the team as well.
• Due to lockdown situation, it has become challenging to conduct the group sessions as per our usual modality and so we have to conduct the sessions in smaller groups.
• There is increased rate of identification of patients with COVID-19 in both camps and host community. Despite maintaining all safety precautions, our teammates remain vulnerable to being infected with COVID-19
Learning:
• It will be better if the package of inputs for gardening (seeds and fertilizers for home gardening and seeds, fertilizers and other inputs for model gardening) was given to beneficiaries at once.
• For maintaining proper safety precautions, group sessions are being conducted in small groups of 4/5 members. While it is of utmost importance to keep safe during this pandemic, we cannot overlook the need of disseminating crucial nutrition related messages.
• Regular and frequent follow up of beneficiaries resulted in a good rapport of SARPV team with the beneficiaries. It also helped in identifying the needs of beneficiaries and providing necessary support to them.
• If donors share the monthly activity plan beforehand, it is easier for us to plan and implement the activities.
Glimpse of the Project
Conduction of MCG Session in host community
Physiotherapist demonstrating at Rohingya Camp
Success Story of Setara Begum (HYPERLINK)
