Roadtripping with the Counterparts

The Peace Corps recently offered a 3 day nutrition training to PCVs in Tamba, Kedougou, and Kolda regions, and the best part was that we got to bring our counterparts.  The point was to link nutrition and agriculture, two of the most important aspects of food security.  I brought my community counterpart, Moussa, who is a farmer, part owner of a cashew transformation business, and a new relais; and Fatou, our village's longstanding relais.

During the training volunteers and counterparts were split up, since volunteers had already received most of the training during PST or IST.  this was counterparts could go into detail (in Wolof) while not having to worry about translating for their volunteers, and volunteers could quickly and easily discuss the issues relevant to their communities. The training was an overall success.  Moussa and Fatou said they learned a lot, and they each got a nutrition handbook they can keep until the end of time.
At the end of training the three of us made an action plan- what could we do in village with this new bounty of knowledge?  So far Moussa and I have done a complet talk and neighboring Sare Hamidou with our good friend Hoyo, and Fatou joined us for a talk in Sanankoro.

We talked about basic nutrition for everyone.  There are so many different guidelines for how to feed different age groups (especially pregnant and nursing women and children under 5) but we decided to stay general for our first health talk.  What exactly does gnutrition mean? Why do we need to eat healthy? What are we doing not to ensure we have access to nutritious meals, and what can we change?


To drive the point home and give a concrete example of what makes a good meal, we used the complet model.  This sis a Senegal-specific example using traditional Senegalese dress.  he tikka, or headwrap, represents this foods that makes you smart- fruits and vegetables; the shirt represents things that make you strong- fish, peanuts, eggs, meat, beans; and the skirt represents foods that give you energy- corn, rice millet, bread.  We had the women place drawn pictures of food on the complet based on how its nutritional content affects your body.  They got it, but there was a big discussion on whether it's feasible or not, because of money or seasonal availability.

This will be an ongoing project.  we'll conduct home visits with the women to make sure they understood our message, and take the opportunity to talk to their husbands as well.  Inshallah, this will be a onthly event, so look forward to similar posts!