188体育

鈥淚 learn about nutrition 3 days a week at the nutrition classes,鈥� says Hawa.

鈥淚鈥檝e learnt that it鈥檚 important to make porridge for the baby and that you have to add roasted peanut and a little bit of sugar to make it sweet. I鈥檝e also learned that when you have a baby, you shouldn鈥檛 take it to one of the mothers in the village for breastfeeding, it鈥檚 better to do it yourself.鈥澛�

Hawa is 1 of many mothers attending a nutrition support group in Namissica, Mozambique.聽Run by Save the Children and led by a community volunteer, this is one of many such groups supported by UK aid. They are important in helping to promote good nutrition practices for young children and pregnant women.

Mothers like Hawa聽are shown how to prepare meals for a balanced diet -聽for example, xima (maize flour mixed with water), dried fish sauce and nutritious leaves from the moringa tree, with seasonal fruit.聽

Services like these are vital for communities in Mozambique, where over a third of children die from malnutrition. More than 1.5 million children under the age of five grow up stunted and聽poor nutrition leads to weakened immune systems and damaged brain development.

Losing out young

Both Hawa and her 20-year-old daughter Habiba have already lost children to malnutrition. One of Hawa鈥檚 other children, 3-year-old Ali, is severely stunted at 3 foot tall - the average for his age is 3 foot 5 inches. His 7-year-old brother Jamal is also stunted. He鈥檚 3 foot 8 inches but should be 4 foot 1 inches.

Their stunting has been caused by a lack of nutritious food over a long period of time, coupled with diseases like malaria and diarrhoea which have聽robbed them of essential nutrients.

And because they鈥檝e been chronically malnourished, Ali and Jamal will never reach their full potential. Their stunted growth is an indication that their brain development is also stunted and they are at greater risk of infections. The effects will last a lifetime.

If a child is stunted by the age of 2, it鈥檚 very unlikely that any interventions will allow them to catch them up. And there鈥檚 an intergenerational effect - malnourished mothers are at greater risk of having malnourished children, who are at greater risk of having malnourished children themselves.

The crucial first 1,000 days

The only way to break the vicious cycle of malnutrition is to intervene during pregnancy and the first two years of life, commonly referred to as the 鈥榝irst 1,000 days.鈥� (9 months of pregnancy + 24 months of life = 1,000 days.)

Staff hope that聽by attending Save the Children nutrition classes and participating in agriculture and livelihood activities, the cycle of malnutrition can be broken in Hawa鈥檚 family.

However, it will be hard - rising food prices mean that they can鈥檛 afford things like eggs, meat, and nutritious fruits and vegetables.

But despite this, mothers and fathers in聽the community聽are already saying that the programme has helped their children聽become better nourished and healthier.聽And their development is improving - children are starting to walk at about 12 months old, rather than at 2 years - a sign that the cycle of malnutrition might be breaking.

Nutrition for growth

The UK government and the Children鈥檚 Investment Fund Foundation (CIFF) will be co-hosting a high-level international meeting, Nutrition for Growth: Beating Hunger through Business and Science on 8 June 2013 in London.