Enriching the Future & Food Access

(I need your help funding my nutrition project: https://donate.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=donate.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=14-303-007. Explained more below...)

When I found out I was coming to Cambodia, one of my first thoughts was about the food. My line of thinking went something like this, "French-Thai-Vietnamese fusion food!" and I began to salivate. In reality, I quickly learned that while there is some influence from outside the country's borders, Khmer food has a unique culinary tradition all to itself that is deeply entrenched. 

So when it comes to talking about and tackling the issues of malnutrition - under nutrition, stunting, wasting, mild and severe malnutrition, and anemia - there are many beliefs and misconceptions. This is not surprising as there is plenty of confusion and changing trends in nutritional science around the world. So much so that the occasional naysayer will throw up their hands and give up with a "let them eat food!" And a times I feel like doing that myself, especially when the over-salted dried fish and the fermented fish paste (prahock) are placed in front of me for a meal. But then I look at the numbers "malnutrition rates in Cambodia remain stubbornly high; almost 40 percent of children are chronically malnourished and micronutrient deficiencies, especially iron, vitamin A and iodine, are high among children under 5 and pregnant and lactating women. " (World Food Program and Cambodian Demographic Health Survey 2010) And these stats are what I see around me. Kids with stunted growth and development. Seeing is believing... and believing that good nutrition can become the norm. 

This year, the Ministry of Health and other health international NGOs have been teaming up to push for better nutrition for infants. Currently on TV there is a campaign running about the nutritional benefits and deliciousness of something called "bobor kap krope kreoung" or enriched rice porridge, targeting mothers with children under 2 years of age (there is even a little catchy jingle to go with it). Bobor (rice porridge - rice, water, salt, and sometimes sugar, chili, crushed peanuts, sprouts and fish or pork bits) is a traditional Khmer breakfast food and in its most basic form, THE thing to eat when you are sick people say, despite its lack of nutrients. In my market alone there are over 15 bobor vendors. All ages eat it. But NO ONE sells the enriched bobor that fortifies the traditional meal with enough vitamins and minerals for proper growth and development during those most crucial months (6-24) of a person's life. 

I have done feeding session and educational talks about proper nutrition which have been successful in that the pregnant women and new mothers I worked with learned how to make the enriched bobor and the infants got a meal of good nutrition. But those sessions proved to not have much of a lasting impact. The skills and knowledge were not put into practice, because of a number of perceived barriers - "the ingredients are too expensive to make it regularly," "my kid doesn't eat a lot so I know s/he doesn't like it," "no one sells it," "I don't have time," etc.  After talking with my counterpart and the HC's super midwife (Ee Chhat) we came up with a plan to try to eliminate some of the barriers. And thus the Enriching the Future: Supplying Communities with Improved Access to Proper Childhood Nutrition was born. In early January, I applied for a Peace Corps Partnership Project (PCPP) grant to help three existing bobor vendors, in three different villages, expand their businesses to include enriched bobor and offer a better option for nutritional meals for parents of children 6 months to 2 years old. With the community's support and assistance from you all back home, together we can enrich the future! Please consider donating to this project: https://donate.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=donate.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=14-303-007. 

an enriched bobor feeding session

help out this little guy!