Grant Development Objectives (GDO):
- Reduce child mortality, morbidity and improve physical growth, cognitive development and future productivity of 1.8 million children in poor provinces
- Improve impact, reach and cost-effectiveness of Government investments to improve nutrition including the reduction of anemia and vitamin A deficiencies.
Expected Key Performance Indicators
- Build capacity of the National Institute of Nutrition (NIN), 18 provinces, 173 districts and 27,498 local village health posts along with community volunteers and NGOs (women's union and others) for sustained community based delivery of vitamin A and deworming tablets twice annually.
- Bi-annual vitamin A capsule campaigns expanded to an additional 720,000 children from current coverage of approximately 900,000 children (those in cohort 6-36 months) to coverage of 1.6 million children (for cohort 6-60 months).
- Bi-annual distribution of deworming medication (mebendazole) introduced to benefit 1.4 million children in the cohort 12-60 months of age (currently none are receiving).
- As a result of expanded vitamin A distribution and introduced deworming, reduce prevalence of vitamin A deficiency (50%), anemia (75%) and parasitic infection prevalence (40-80%) in project areas.
- Establish sustained government financing, for biannual distribution of vitamin A capsules to all children 6-60 months and de-worming tablets for children 12-60 months.
Component A: Communications and Program Coordination
Activities under this component will support program development, policy and communication activities at the national and provincial level in order to integrate protocols and strategies into the annual cascade of training conducted by the Protein Energy Malnutrition Control Program (PEMCP) at district, commune and village level.
Component B:
Integrated Procurement, Distribution and Delivery of Vitamin A Capsules & De- worming Tablets. This component will support the procurement, storage and delivery of mebendazole (deworming) tablets and an additional 900,000 (approximately) vitamin A capsules to expand the coverage of the vitamin A distribution program to children 37-60 months (current coverage only for 6-36 month olds). Procurement is based on population of children 6-60 months old (or 12-60 months for the deworming) in 18 project provinces plus 10% wastage allowance. The project will finance 100% of tablet costs for Distributions 1 and 2, 75% for Distributions 3 and 4, and 25% of Distribution 5. Thereafter, full financing is expected through the PEMCP. All incremental record keeping, storage and transport costs will be absorbed in the current PEMCP budget beginning with from the first distribution round.
Component C:
Community Mobilization, Capacity Building and Integrated Vitamin A & Deworming Tablet/IEC Distribution. Vitamin A distribution is currently implemented by a community mobilization campaign in two rounds annually. The JFPR Project will implement an "enhanced" portion of this campaign for 5 rounds of expanded vitamin A distribution for children 36-60 months and mebendazole (deworming treatment) distribution for all children 6 -60 months.
Component D:
Monitoring, Evaluation and Policy Development. Major activities in this component include a series of evaluation activities designed to build an evidence-based case for sustained financing and expansion of the program on a national basis. Key evaluation indicators will include coverage, decrease in prevalence and load of parasite infections and also the impact of the expanded program on key national nutrition and health goals - namely the reduction of vitamin A deficiency, anemia and child growth.