Boedecker, J.

Kennedy, G.

Odhiambo, F.O.

Termote, Céline

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Tropentag, September 20-22, 2017, Bonn“Future Agriculture:Socio-ecological transitions and bio-cultural shifts”Participatory Approach to Increase Dietary Diversity throughAgricultural Activities and Nutrition Education in Western KenyaJulia Boedecker1, Francis Odour Odhiambo2, Céline Termote3, Gina Kennedy41Bioversity International, Healthy Diets from Sustainable Food Systems, Kenya2Bioversity International, Healthy Diets from Sustainable Food Systems,3Bioversity International, Healthy Diets from Sustainable Food Systems, Kenya4Bioversity International, Healthy Diets from Sustainable Food Systems, ItalyAbstractThis research examines the suitability of a community-based participatory approach toincrease dietary diversity through agricultural activities and nutrition education in VihigaCounty, Western Kenya. It arises from a project that is part of the nutrition cross-cuttingcluster work within Humidtropics, a CGIAR research programme. The project consistsof a baseline survey covering agricultural biodiversity and nutrition of women and smallchildren, a phase of participatory development and implementation of community activitiesto improve nutrition and an endline survey.During the baseline survey, data was collected in 10 randomly selected sub-locationsin Vihiga County. After pair-matching, five (intervention sub-locations) of the 10 sub-lo-cations took part in participatory workshops to develop community activities to improvenutrition, while the other five served as control. During the first year of implementing thechosen activities, the communities received agricultural training and nutrition education.The endline survey covered the 10 sub-locations surveyed at the baseline. Within the fiveintervention sub-locations, households were further stratified as beneficiaries (participa-ting in development and implementation of activities; receiving agricultural training andnutrition education) and non-beneficiaries (receiving nutrition education).Even though Vihiga County is rich in local food biodiversity (67 cultivated and 38 wildedible species), diets lack diversity. In the participatory workshops the communities deci-ded to do kitchen gardening and poultry raising to diversify diets. Children and womenfrom the control group had significantly lower mean dietary diversity scores (4.0 and 4.8,respectively), compared to the non-beneficiaries (4.5 and 5.3, respectively), and beneficia-ries (4.6 and 5.5) (p = 0.000). A much higher proportion of children and women of thecontrol (28 % and 30 %, respectively) than in the non-beneficiary (10 % and 15 %, respec-tively) and beneficiary group (12 % and 13 %, respectively) did not meet minimum dietarydiversity.Looking at dietary diversity and the measures applied to improve it, it can be assumedthat nutrition education had the greatest effect, before participatory agricultural activitiesand agricultural trainings. This assumption however only derived from the endline dataanalysis. Baseline and endline survey data still need to be compared in order to verifywhich of the measures worked toward the improvement of dietary diversity.Contact Address: Julia Boedecker, Bioversity International, Healthy Diets from Sustainable Food Systems, c/oICRAF, P.O. Box 30677, 00100 Nairobi, Kenya, e-mail: j.boedecker@cgiar.orgKeywords: Agrobiodiversity, community-based participatory approach, dietary diversity, nutrition,nutrition education

Participatory approach to increase dietary diversity through agricultural activities and nutrition education in Western Kenya

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Participatory approach to increase dietary diversity through agricultural activities and nutrition education in Western Kenya

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