ZINCKO, 10 August 2009 (IRIN) - For village health volunteers in Burkina Faso who help track malnutrition in their rural communities, farm work during the rainy season takes precedence over their volunteerism, according to the NGO Save the Children.

"They disappear when the rain falls," Save the Children's village health worker trainer, Kinané Victorine, told IRIN. "They are hard to count on during the rainy season, when they do not do their job as well."

After the harvest in November and December and generally during the dry season, Kinané said the health workers become more reliable. "But until then, their nutrition advocacy and monitoring become second priority – even for their own immediate family," said Kinané, who works with health workers referring patients to four clinics.

Save the Children's staff said they have not analysed how many village health workers have malnourished children.

Since September 2008 Save the Children started training more than 600 state health volunteers in central north Kaya district's more than 300 villages, paying each US$5 per month to pick up extra nutrition monitoring duties beyond their usual work on vaccination campaigns.

Two health workers per village received bands to measure under-five children's arm circumference every two months for signs of malnutrition. They also ensure that families use food rations from the health clinic for their children rather than the entire family, said Save the Children's country nutrition coordinator Jean Nadebega.

Families with malnourished children receive flour, oil and sugar from the UN World Food Programme as well as soap from Save the Children and green bean seeds from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

Nadebega told IRIN that during the growing season, typically from May until October, village health workers devote time to nutrition activities only when they come back from the fields.

In one of Zincko's sub-villages, Goodo, Makido Elai Sawadogo visits families and tracks malnutrition among the community's 149 under-five children. When asked why he accepted the responsibility despite a busy growing season, he told IRIN: "These are our children. What choice do we have?"

On his bicycle he visits families up to 4km away to check on malnourished children – when he has the time.

He told IRIN it is only natural he takes care of his field before he talks about nutrition to the community. "If we do not plant our crops, then that is a guarantee we will not have enough food at harvest time. Then everyone will go hungry. It does little good to talk when we should be working," he explained as he prepared to go to his field after a downpour the previous day.

As Christine Ouedraogo headed to the field, hoe in hand and her child – recently diagnosed with moderate malnutrition – on her back, IRIN asked her if she knew what malnutrition was. "I cannot explain it," she said. "But I know I need to feed her millet porridge from what they give me at the health clinic."

As of May 2009 during the last arm-measuring campaign, 10 of Goodo's 149 children were classified as malnourished.

From July to December 2008 Zincko's population had an acute malnutrition rate of 4 percent, as measured by children's height, weight and arm size, according to Save the Children – lower than the national average of 12.4 percent, as reported in a May 2009 preliminary government study.


Source http://www.irinnews.org