Western Highlands Program of Integrated Actions for Food Security and Nutrition/Programa de Acciones Integrales de Seguridad Alimentaria y Nutricional de Occidente (PAISANO)
The project’s overall goal is to reduce food and nutrition insecurity for the most vulnerable rural families in targeted regions. To achieve the goal, PAISANO aims to increase household access to food, reduce malnutrition among girls and boys under age five, and improve community resilience. PAISANO’s main strategies to improve food security are to improve agricultural productivity and production, enhance farm and non-farm income to improve food availability and access, and improve health and nutritional outcomes of poor and vulnerable households. PAISANO serves 26,500 vulnerable rural families in the region.
Activity Description
The project aims to do the following:
- Improving maternal nutrition and health, with a focus on pregnant and lactating women as well as adolescent girls;
- Improving nutritional status and nutrition awareness among single and newly married adolescent girls and their families;
- Improving access to safe drinking water and appropriate sanitation and improving hygiene practices;
- Improving adoption of key essential nutrition, hygiene and health practices through effective use of social and behavior change communication (SBCC) interventions
Activities include training farmers and agricultural leaders in improved crop production techniques and natural resource management, creating micro-watershed communities, facilitating savings and lending groups, improving preventative health services and referrals, providing conditional food rations, strengthening community groups for disaster preparedness and emergency response, and establishing municipal-level early warning systems. PAISANO aims to ensure gender equality, mitigate environmental consequences, and influence behavior change.
Expected Outcomes
- Quality of community-level MCHN services improved
- Knowledge of and attitudes towards key MCHN practices improved
- Knowledge of and attitudes towards household sanitation and hygiene practices improved
- Community preparedness to manage and respond to shocks increased.
- Community and municipality governance improved
Actual Outcomes
- 2833 households have received water filters
