KOICA Fights Malnutrition in Pakistan: A Beacon of Hope for a Healthier Tomorrow
Nutrition Education Center for Improving Child and Community Nutrition in Pakistan
Project to Strengthen Water Quality Monitoring Capacity Also Completed
The Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) announced on the 20th that it held a completion ceremony for the ‘Nutrition Education Center for Improving Nutrition for Children and Local Areas in Pakistan’ at the Faisalabad Agricultural University in Punjab, eastern Pakistan, on the 19th (local time).
The Nutrition Education Center, built on three floors above ground and approximately 3,000 square meters, includes dormitory facilities that can accommodate more than 30 people, a large conference room, a library, and lecture rooms. Four laboratories equipped with equipment for analyzing food nutritional components are scheduled to be built within this year.
This is part of a project that KOICA has been promoting since 2020 with an investment of 7 million dollars (approximately 9.3 billion won).
Through this project, KOICA will provide training to approximately 12,000 people, including teachers and clinical nutritionists in frontline schools, through ‘master trainers’ who are nutrition education experts, in cooperation with universities in five provinces across Pakistan. After completing this course, these people will then go back to each village and spread the related information to approximately 120,000 residents, including students and parents.
The 35 master trainers who received training in Korea at the invitation of KOICA last year and returned home plan to develop lectures, teaching materials, and recipes using local agricultural products and upload them to their YouTube channel.
Pakistan, an agricultural country, has a relatively high food self-sufficiency rate, but about half of the population is malnourished, with 44% of children under the age of five suffering from stunted growth and 15% suffering from acute malnutrition.
KOICA said that the main causes of this are not only poverty but also incorrect perceptions about food and lack of nutritional knowledge, and that there is a severe shortage of personnel and facilities to correct this.
Ambassador to Pakistan Park Ki-joon said at the completion ceremony, “I hope that the nutrition education center established with support from the Korean government will establish itself as a sustainable successful model that contributes to strengthening food security in Pakistan.”
Iqlal Ahmad Khan, Vice Chancellor of Faisalabad University of Agriculture, said, “The nutrition education center will be of great help in improving the nutritional status and promoting health of the Pakistani people,” and added, “I hope that the bilateral relationship between Korea and Pakistan will develop further.”
On the 12th, KOICA held the 3rd Results Sharing Workshop and Closing Ceremony for the ‘Project to Strengthen Water Quality Monitoring System Capacity for Achieving Clean Water and Sanitation (SDG6) in Pakistan’ at the Serena Hotel in Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan.
This is a project that KOICA has been conducting from 2019 to this year to lay the foundation for providing safe drinking water to the Pakistani people. In cooperation with five Pakistani ministries, including the Ministry of Climate Change, we have also carried out the construction of water quality analysis infrastructure, training of professional personnel, and development of a data management system.