Priyanshi Educational, Cultural & Social Society (PECSS)

Nutrition development programs for rural and tribal women (Pregnant/Lactating) and children (0-6 years) including value addition of food, awareness on sanitation, hygiene and safe drinking water practices

The Priyanshi Educational, Cultural & Social Society conducted an integrated nutrition development program for 572 pregnant / lactating women, 376 adolescent girls and 770 children (0 to 6 years) from 15 villages in Sendhwa block of Barwani district during 2018 to 2021. The main objective of this program is to remove the problem of anemia in women, adolescent girls and to eliminate the problem of malnutrition in children. Under this integrated program organized in collaboration with IGSSS, ToTs to ICDS team on maternity development, vaccination and service delivery, training to prepare nutritious dishes from locally available foods, distribution of nutritious kits to women, awareness on myths and misconceptions on menstruation, sanitary Napkins distribution to adolescent girls, awareness on hygiene and sanitation etc. Apart from this, kitchen gardens were set up in the courtyards of the targeted families so that they can get green vegetables every day.

Under the program, Kadaknath chicks were also distributed to the targeted families by training them, so that eggs could be provided to the families as a regular diet, as well as they could earn extra income from Kadaknath farming. Thus, through the above integrated program, nutritional problems in pregnant / lactating mothers, adolescent girls and children between 0 and 6 years reduced by 60 percent in the target villages and work was done to improve their standard of living. In the same way, PECSS has been working extensively on nutrition and hygiene development under which more than 150 Nutritious Kitchen Gardens have been developed by the organization in the area, so that these families get regular fruits and vegetables in their meal as well as then can earn money from extra vegetables and fruits. Apart from this, awareness campaign was organized at the large level on using toilets regularly, wash practices, safe drinking water practices and Inclusion of all types of cereals, pulses and vegetables in the food. In Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, nutritional development related programs are being organized continuously by the organisation for the last 10 years.

Similarly, Integrated Nutrition Development Program for more than 150 pregnant / lactating women, 345 children (0-6 years) and adolescent girls of 03 villages in Chittaurgarh district of Rajasthan was organized during the year 2020-2021. Under this program also training of ICDS team towards improving nutrition level, variety of training to targeted women (pregnant/lactating), nutrition and hygiene kit distribution, making of more than 100 kitchen gardens, awareness on hygiene, sanitation and COVID-19 through the program like short films and street plays. The positive result of all these activities was that the malnutrition situation among the children of the targeted villages is reduced by 70 percent, the condition of anemia improved by up to 50 percent and the problem of menstrual problems in adolescent girls was reduced by 80 percent. In this way, in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan, the PECSS is successfully moving towards the nutritional development of women.