Daphrose Nyirakomeza, a 38- year-old mother of four struggled for a long time seeing her children affected by malnutrition. Being a farmer, she still didn’t understand why her children were stunted.
This is a problem she shared with some of her neighbors in Karongi district, in the western region of Rwanda.
Nyirakomeza’s household was later identified, by local leaders, as one of the most vulnerable families in the district, hence eligible to benefit from the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO).
FAO has an integrated approach that delivers a social protection package with the aim of preventing, managing, and overcoming situations that adversely affect people’s well-being. It is a combination of anticipatory actions including distribution of agricultural inputs and assets, technical training geared towards organic and climate-smart practices, and access to market and nutrition education.
FAO’s intervention and other support provided by other UN agencies in Rwanda, in various areas of socio-economic development, make a full social protection package that is bolstering self-reliance spirit of Rwandan farmers.
Nyirakomeza, who was normally a farmer of cassava and potatoes, received vegetable seeds from FAO and was trained on maintaining a kitchen garden, where she started growing fruits and vegetables with the manure from a goat she also received as part of her support package.
She shared that sometimes malnutrition is not as a result of poverty, but of limited skills on the required nutritious foods. "It is a shame that in many cases our children get stunted just because we’re unable to know which foods are more nutritious. Now after being trained by FAO on a balanced diet, I have decided that my children will never be malnourished again,” she said.
Nyirakomeza has taken it upon herself to share learned knowledge with her neighbors with the same problems.
FAO supported the likes of Nyirakomeza as a participating UN Agency in the UN Rwanda’s Joint Project on "Accelerating Integrated Policy Interventions to Promote Social Protection in Rwanda”, in collaboration with World Food Program and UNICEF.
Ester Bihoyiki, 36, mother of five, also shares the same testimony. "Life has changed here in my house. We eat fruits and vegetables at every meal we take,” pointing at her son, she said, "Look, my last born, one year old, healthy and very handsome. At this age, he could be malnourished but he is not because I have learned all about good nutrition.”
FAO provided her with a support package that includes chicken, a goat to provide organic fertilizer and seeds for vegetables and fruits.
"We eat vegetables at home and I take the rest to the local market. I manage my own money, I am no longer a poor rural woman, who always asks for help from her husband”, said Louise Niyigenda, another beneficiary. Adding that she makes enough weekly money to cover for her family’s health insurance and helps with overall family development.
FAO Representative in Rwanda, Coumba Sow, noted that Social protection has a critical role to play in boosting productivity, improving food and nutrition security and stimulating inclusive economic growth, but that it cannot alone address all the risks and challenges faced by smallholder farmers.
Integrated and anticipated interventions have shown greater impacts than stand-alone social protection interventions or agricultural specific measures, she said.
FAO’s activities were carried out with financial support from the UN Sustainable Development Goal Fund. In 2019, FAO joined two other UN agencies, UNICEF and WFP, under the stewardship of the UN Resident Coordinator’s Office to develop a Joint Programme on "Accelerating Integrated Policy Interventions to Promote Social Protection in Rwanda”.
The Joint Project was funded for the period December 2019 to June 2022 with a geographical scope at the national level, for policy work and systems strengthening, and at the community level, for community support in 5 districts namely Burera, Karongi, Kirehe, Nyamagabe and Rutsiro.