FAO Publishes Health Assessment for the Resilient School Feeding Programme in Saint Lucia
An official conducting the health assessment.
17/04/2023
Castries, Saint Lucia – The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) provides countries with technical support to conduct nutrition and health assessments for in-depth analysis of community-based food and nutrition programmes.
Under the ‘Resilient School Feeding Programme’ sub-project of the Mexico-CARICOM-FAO “Cooperation for Climate Change Adaptation and Resilience in the Caribbean”, or Resilient Caribbean Initiative in short, sustainable healthy diets, core food skills, and the use of local food sources are promoted. The programme focuses on building the capacity development of government in combating multiple forms of malnutrition alongside other development challenges.
As part of the programme, FAO recently partnered with the Ministry of Education, Sustainable Development, Innovation, Science, Technology and Vocational Training, Saint Lucia to conduct a health assessment to review the school feeding programme menu to meet students’ health demands. The health assessment was implemented among 403 students at seventy-five (75) schools.
FAO National Project Coordinator Cherry Smith stated “Overall, the results indicate that students are at the healthy end of the spectrum and most of the highs and lows are at borderline. From the results, the menu appears to be sufficiently diverse, with options that cater to the needs of all students.”
Project Nutrition Consultant Euthalia Philgence explained “It gave us a glimpse as to what the nutritional status of our students are. We wanted to ensure that the menu we are creating are meeting the needs of our students. We achieved that goal by taking the students blood pressure, their body mass index, and their blood glucose level.”
According to the Pan American Health Organization, in 2015, the reported prevalence of arterial hypertension (high blood pressure) among people aged 18 years or older was 27.1% and the prevalence of diabetes mellitus, was 14.5% in 2014.
Ministry of Agriculture Chief Agri-Enterprise Development Officer Thaddeus Constantine noted “We wanted to ensure that within the school feeding programme, the work that we do, would be able to address some of these challenges and to ensure that the students would be provided with the best opportunities to learn. This assessment should be continued, repeated annually, and extended to the secondary schools so we get a clear indication of the health of our students.”
This health assessment will therefore help the Saint Lucia Government design policies and action plans aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals, specifically goal 2 which seeks sustainable solutions to end hunger in all its forms by 2030 and to achieve food security. There are currently 7767 registered students in the infant, primary and special education schools.
The commitment of FAO to school health and nutrition in the Caribbean is funded in Bahamas, Belize, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago by the Mexican Agency for International Development Cooperation (AMEXCID).
Under the ‘Resilient School Feeding Programme’ sub-project of the Mexico-CARICOM-FAO “Cooperation for Climate Change Adaptation and Resilience in the Caribbean”, or Resilient Caribbean Initiative in short, sustainable healthy diets, core food skills, and the use of local food sources are promoted. The programme focuses on building the capacity development of government in combating multiple forms of malnutrition alongside other development challenges.
As part of the programme, FAO recently partnered with the Ministry of Education, Sustainable Development, Innovation, Science, Technology and Vocational Training, Saint Lucia to conduct a health assessment to review the school feeding programme menu to meet students’ health demands. The health assessment was implemented among 403 students at seventy-five (75) schools.
FAO National Project Coordinator Cherry Smith stated “Overall, the results indicate that students are at the healthy end of the spectrum and most of the highs and lows are at borderline. From the results, the menu appears to be sufficiently diverse, with options that cater to the needs of all students.”
Project Nutrition Consultant Euthalia Philgence explained “It gave us a glimpse as to what the nutritional status of our students are. We wanted to ensure that the menu we are creating are meeting the needs of our students. We achieved that goal by taking the students blood pressure, their body mass index, and their blood glucose level.”
According to the Pan American Health Organization, in 2015, the reported prevalence of arterial hypertension (high blood pressure) among people aged 18 years or older was 27.1% and the prevalence of diabetes mellitus, was 14.5% in 2014.
Ministry of Agriculture Chief Agri-Enterprise Development Officer Thaddeus Constantine noted “We wanted to ensure that within the school feeding programme, the work that we do, would be able to address some of these challenges and to ensure that the students would be provided with the best opportunities to learn. This assessment should be continued, repeated annually, and extended to the secondary schools so we get a clear indication of the health of our students.”
This health assessment will therefore help the Saint Lucia Government design policies and action plans aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals, specifically goal 2 which seeks sustainable solutions to end hunger in all its forms by 2030 and to achieve food security. There are currently 7767 registered students in the infant, primary and special education schools.
The commitment of FAO to school health and nutrition in the Caribbean is funded in Bahamas, Belize, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago by the Mexican Agency for International Development Cooperation (AMEXCID).