Zulai Abdulmalik, Gender and Nutrition Specialist with Oxfam in Bauchi says her organization has trained 1000 women in six local government areas of Bauchi state under its Livelihood and Nutrition Empowerment (LINE) project.
Zulai who stated this while speaking with Journalists during the World Food Day celebration in Bauchi noted that the beneficiaries are trained on home gardening to enable them grow vegetables behind their households.
She said the training was to create opportunities for women in Gamawa, Shira, Darazo, Ningi, Alkaleri and Tafawa Balewa to enable them to have access to nutritious food.
According to Zulai Oxfam does that by supporting the beneficiaries with legumes, soya beans with which they can have nutritious milk, especially for their children.
“The legumes, when they mix with things like maize, sorghum and the rest of them, they will get good milk”, she explained.
Zulai said that the beneficiaries of the project are also trained on infant and young child feeding which comprises exclusive breastfeeding and complementary feeding.
“The campaign on exclusive breastfeeding has been going on especially in Nigeria for women to give their babies only breast milk for the period of six months before they could give the child anything”, she said.
Zulai who however decried that many women don’t really practice that, noted that her organization is working assiduously to change that habit.
She said that one of the important components of infant and young child feeding is the exclusive breastfeeding, adding that her NGO has carried out campaigns around the six LGAs of Bauchi state to that regard.
“Also, Complementary feeding is a complement of Infant and Young Child Feeding (IYCF) that’s from six months of age what happens to these children; what kind of food are they supposed to take. “We teach them how to produce things like tombrown which comprises legumes and cereals and some kind of vegetables’ ‘, Zulai pointed out.
The 60 months project funded by Global Affairs Canada (GAC) is implemented by Oxfam in Bauchi State, Northeast Nigeria, with the aim of promoting agriculture-driven economic growth and improving living conditions for 10,000 rural farmer households in six LGAs of Bauchi State.
