Senegal
Credit to improve nutrition for Senegal's poor

afrol News, 18 July - The World Bank is disbursing its US$ 14.7 million "Nutrition Enhancement Programme" for Senegal, officials in the country report. The Senegalese government was now looking for "credible" partners at local community level to implement the programme's intentions of helping "vulnerable groups" locally. 

The World Bank credit was approved already in March this year, and aims at supporting the "growth of children under three in poor rural and urban areas through community nutrition programs," according to the Bank. The project would also "help to build the institutional and organisational capacity to carry out and evaluate nutrition interventions," the Bank added.

According to the Senegalese news agency APS, an "official source" had now announced the implementation of the extensive programme. The implementation would necessitate complicated "multi-sector interventions" and the cooperation between "the majority of the technical ministries (health, agriculture, family and early childhood in particular) but also civil society," the source had told APS. 

The 2002-05 project would cover 34 Senegalese districts and therefore needed to find local partners in all these areas to make sure the programme was "adapted to local realities." The second phase of the project (2006-10) would even see a geographical extension of activities.

The seemingly late Senegalese response to the World Bank's March approval of the Nutrition Enhancement Programme is rather the norm in such extensive development projects. Indeed, such credits often are not disbursed at all due to the lack of administrative capacity to implement multi-sector programmes in recipient nations. World Bank introduced structural reforms also have cut back on developing countries' administrative staff. 

In Senegal, the nutrition programme will be of much need if well implemented. The country has relatively high rates of malnutrition. According to the latest data of UNICEF, 4.1 percent of Senegalese children aged 0-5 years suffer from "severe underweight," while a total of 18.4 percent of the same age group suffers from underweight. 

Sources: Based on World Bank, APS and afrol archives

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