By Sallieu S. Kanu
The Vice President of Sierra Leone, Dr Mohamed Juldeh Jalloh together with the UNICEF Representative, Rudolf Schwenk, on Thursday, October 26, 2023, handed over 3,400 cartons of Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) to the National Medical Supplies Agency (NMSA), which were jointly procured by the Government of Sierra Leone and the Nutrition Match Window on an equal basis.
The Nutrition Match Window is a global initiative funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Children’s Investment Fund Foundation and Foreign and Commonwealth Development Organisation (FCDO) which facilitates matching of governments’ contributions toward Nutrition programmes. This is an innovative approach to securing vital public financing for nutrition and plays a critical role to treat and prevent wasting and other forms of malnutrition among children under five years. This initiative has provided a catalytic role in securing government funding for the first time towards therapeutic nutrition supplies for the management of severe malnutrition.
Malnutrition is associated with nearly half of all child deaths globally and therefore, preventing and treating malnutrition in Sierra Leone will significantly lower infant mortality rates. In Sierra Leone, 26 per cent of children under five are stunted and 5.2 per cent are “wasted” or too thin. A severely malnourished child is 11 times more likely to succumb to common childhood illnesses. However, the country has made good progress in reducing malnutrition especially stunting and underweight since 2010 and the rates of malnutrition are generally lower than the regional and Africa averages.
“This is the first time we are allocating budgetary support to fund the procurement of nutrition supplies for children under five in Sierra Leone,” said Dr Mohamed Juldeh Jalloh, Vice President of Sierra Leone as he delivered the supplies. “We should not only be at the receiving end and this action is a clear demonstration of our government’s commitment to drastically reduce under-five mortality in the country. Our government will increase the budgetary allocation to Nutrition supplies in next year’s budget.”
UNICEF and the Ministry of Health acknowledge the continued support of development partners that support nutrition programmes in Sierra Leone. These include the Government of Japan, Latter-Day Saints Charities, FCDO, Irish Aid, USAID, the Canadian and French Governments, among others.
“I congratulate the Government of Sierra Leone, as one of only eight countries in Africa to allocate domestic funding specifically to procure RUTF and to successfully leverage the Nutrition Match Window to double its supplies,” said Rudolf Schwenk, UNICEF Representative to Sierra Leone. “This is a clear demonstration of the Government’s strong commitment to address the country’s nutrition challenges.”
This remarkable event was witnessed by the top government officials including the Minister of Health, Dr Austin Demby; Minister of Finance, Mr Sheku Fatamadie Bangura and Minister of State in the Vice President’s Office, Ms Manty Tarawally. Members of the donor community, civil society, Health workers and lactating mothers with their babies were also present at the event.
“We feel so good that the Government is showing strong support and commitment to fighting malnutrition so that our children can live beyond their fifth birthday, realize their potential and contribute to national development,” said Fatu Sesay, a lactating mother of a 2-year-old baby who was at the event.