Catholic Relief Services Rwanda (CRS) has launched a campaign to boost nutrition in a renewed effort to help eliminate all forms of malnutrition in the country.

The campaign, dubbed "Scaling Up Nutrition (Sun),” will provide funding to facilitate different actors, especially civil society organisations, to support government nutritional campaigns such as the 1,000 Days of Nutrition.

During the launch, the country manager CSR-Rwanda, Marie Noelle Senyana-Mottier, urged civil society organisations to join the drive to eliminate malnutrition in the country.

"The Sun movement and the Government of Rwanda believe that a healthy population is a productive one,” Senyana said, adding that Rwanda joined the Sun movement to be aligned with the international effort to fight malnutrition.

Malnutrition rate

Cecile Teteli, Sun programme manager, said although Rwanda has made considerable strides in lowering the rate of acute malnutrition, levels of chronic and moderate malnutrition remain high, especially among children and vulnerable populations.

"According to the 2010 Demographic and Health Survey, 44 per cent of children under five are stunted, and the National Food and Nutrition Policy notes that 70 per cent of children between six and 12 months suffer from anemia,” she added.

Teteli said the objectives of the event were to inform civil society organisations, as well as other stakeholders in nutrition on the importance of a concerted effort to improve the outcome of nutrition in the country.

Dr Vincent Rusanganwa, an official from the Ministry of Health, stressed that fighting malnutrition is not the preserve of the civil society, nor is it for the ministry only, but rather an obligation of everyone in the community.

He also encouraged the University of Rwanda to train more nutritionists.

"While we strive to curb malnutrition in communities, we should get strategies of addressing both sides of malnutrition. We are not as we were ten years ago, we didn’t have regulators but we have since put in place specialists to regulate this process,” Dr Rusanganwa said.