Battling Childhood Stunting
Data from the Indonesia Nutrition Study 2021 showed that the stunting rate in South Central Timor reached 48.3 percent, the highest in East Nusa Tenggara (NTT).
Developing human resources is far more important than the physical development of villages. For this reason, as well as for the purpose of eradicating stunting, Arni Boimau has allocated funds of up to Rp 489 million each year. His village today has just one infant with childhood stunting, compared to the dozens of children who had the syndrome before.
Arni, the head of Enonapi village in Kie district, South Central Timor regency, East Nusa Tenggara, offered a plate of fried bananas. The bright yellow bananas, sprinkled with sea salt, were crunchy on the outside and tender on the inside, both crispy and soft in texture on the first bite.
“These were prepared by people training in how to prepare local foods in our village,” Arni said during a visit at his residence on Monday (30/5/2022).
Also read:
> Challenges in Dealing with Stunting in NTT
Food is one of the keys to tackling stunting. Enonapi has a variety of nutritious foods like corn, sweet potatoes and bananas, which have been usually prepared by boiling, so they are generally tasteless. Infants and children are thus apt to get bored of these foods.
Besides these, parents more frequently feed them rice porridge in the mornings, afternoons and evenings. Just “bland rice”, as Arni describes it, without any garnish. This is compounded by the practice of leaving babies with their grandparents when the parents head to work at the plantations, so they don’t receive sufficient care, especially in terms of nutrition. These factors have caused undernutrition in children and prevalence of stunting in many parts of South Central Timor regency.
Data from the Indonesia Nutrition Study 2021 showed that the stunting rate in South Central Timor reached 48.3 percent, the highest in East Nusa Tenggara (NTT). The data also showed that 48 out of 100 children in the regency were stunted. Enonapi had 32 children with stunting in 2019, which later declined by half to 16 children. This year, it has only one case of childhood stunting.
In addition, the village has provided a food aid program that includes rice, abon (dried shredded meat), eggs and milk as supplementary foods.
The reduction in the number of children with stunting was due to the various strategies Arni had adopted. To improve the nutritional intake of children, he invited representatives of Kie Puskesmas (community health center) to provide training workshops on how to prepare local foods. The village residents are now skilled in preparing different kinds of dishes from sweet potatoes, bananas, corn, and even mung beans. In addition, the village has provided a food aid program that includes rice, abon (dried shredded meat), eggs and milk as supplementary foods.
“But at that time, there was only a slight decrease from 16 to 8 cases of stunting,” said Arni, who then implemented another strategy in 2021, the Youth integrated health post (Posyandu).
Youth Posyandu
The Youth Posyandu was set up to gather youths aged 12 to 18, who were then given instructional courses on food preparation, the dangers of early marriage as well as childcare methods. This latter was included because early marriage remains an important issue in the
village. The teenagers were then expected to share their newly gained knowledge with their parents. In this way, new awareness would spread gradually on the correct way of caring for children.
Arni believes that childhood stunting stems from a complex range of problems, from poor skills in food preparation and nutritional awareness, to the psychological vulnerability of underage parents as a result of early marriage. Also important was household inequality in gender roles. He has observed that many husbands don’t seem to take part in caring for their children and leave childcare to their wives. For Arni, this is wrong. A father should take an active part in caring for and rearing his children, especially in ensuring that they have sufficient nutritional intake.
Arni thus formed the Fatherhood Class and the Motherhood Class. Both classes are meant to provide parents with basic knowledge of equal gender roles and balanced responsibility in caring for their household. In October-November 2021, Arni made it mandatory for all fathers to take their children to the Posyandu have them weighed regularly. It was a major breakthrough and at the same time, an odd sight for Enonapi residents, who had never seen fathers taking their children to the Posyandu before. Many babies were usually seen crying or struggling in their fathers’ arms.
“It proved that fathers aren’t close to their children,” said Arni.
Actively promoting village
For Enonapi residents, Arni is a village head who has a progressive vision and action. They see that the amiable man has brought significant change, particularly in the development of human resources. In 2020, Enonapi village was named the champion of the Village Competition in South Central Timor regency. Human resource development was the main aspect of the competition. More specifically, Enonapi won because of Arni’s success in significantly reducing the village’s stunting rate, a historical achievement due to nothing other than Arni’s strategy.
He has been steadily improving the administration of the village by inviting youths to work with him, even to the present, when stunting has almost vanished from Enonapi.
Arni had long desired to develop his village, which he found was lagging behind. This desire arose when he was 16 and an active member of Plan Indonesia. From his work with the nongovernmental organization, Arni learned much about village empowerment, gender equality and human resource development. In 2016, when he was 25, Arni became the Enonapi village head. He has been steadily improving the administration of the village by inviting youths to work with him, even to the present, when stunting has almost vanished from Enonapi.
One of his key strategies is to prioritize adequate funding for human resource development programs. Last year, he allocated funds totaling Rp 489 million to develop the village. This year’s funding is nearly the same, at more than Rp 400 million. The fund goes towards several programs, including overcoming childhood stunting and preventing early marriage.
The Youth Posyandu, which was originally set up in just one location, for instance, will shortly be expanded to three locations. “It’s too far if it is located in only one place,” said Arni, adding that some youths living around 3 kilometers from the existing Youth Posyandu were reluctant to join.
Arni’s dream is to see zero stunting in Enonapi village, and zero stunting in Indonesia.
Arni Boimau
Born:Enonapi, South Central Timor, 4 April 1990
Education:
- SD Negeri Nono state elementary school
- SMP Negeri South Amanatun 1 state junior high school
- SMK Christian Oinlasi vocational senior high school
(This article was translated by Aris Prawira)