14 Jul 2014

Government is committed to the betterment of the lives of children, says Assistant Minister of Health, Dr Gloria Somolekae.

Speaking at an Infant and Young Child Feeding workshop in Palapye on July 11, Dr Somolekae said government understood the importance of nutrition hence was a signatory to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which recognised freedom from hunger as a human right.

She said government had also ratified the World Food Summit of 1966 and the Declaration of the World Summit for Children in 1990.

Furthermore, she said, government established the Food and Nutrition Unit with the Ministry of Health in the early 70s to design and implement programmes to improve the nutritional status of Batswana.

However, Dr Somolekae said while these were welcome development, the country continued to experience some challenges in the nutrition status of children under the age of five as shown by the 2007 Botswana Family Health Survey.

The survey, she said indicated that 13.5 per cent of Batswana children under the age of five were underweight, 25.9 per cent were stunted and 7.2 per cent were wasted.

In addition, she said data from the same study also indicates that Batswana mothers appear to stop breast feeding earlier than recommended such that only one third of children were still receiving breast milk at 12-15 months. That, she said was a contributor to the poor nutritional status of children in the country Dr

Somolekae further stated that most recently Lancet, a renowned publication reported that optimal breastfeeding in the first two years of life and particularly exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months, has the single largest impact on child survival.

Breastfeeding, she said was an unequalled way of providing ideal food for the healthy growth and development of infants.

However, she said there were many underlying factors as to why mothers did not breast feed which include among others the fear that human milk was insufficient, ignorance of the impact on health, absence of psychological support and feeling that breast feeding ties women down socially.

She said government was steadfast to ensuring that breast feeding was protected as demonstrated by enactment of a food control act of 1993 as well as the Statutory Instrument No.37 of 2005 on marketing of foods for infants and young children.

“It is my belief that if we work together for a common goal we will be able to significantly reduce the rates of malnutrition in the country,” she said. Ends