James Roland-Jones came to realise that parents of little ones in Thailand had limited food choices for their babies when he roamed a neighbourhood supermarket seven years ago, hunting for dietary supplements for his seven-month-old son Peter.
"I had my firstborn child seven years back and we were in the UK at that time. When Peter reached six to seven months, we started to feed him with dietary supplements. In the UK, there are a lot of choices in the market as people there give their babies food supplements when they are as young as four months old. But when we returned to Thailand, the situation turned upside down. These products were really hard to find here," recalled Roland-Jones, who currently works in Thailand.
Inspired by the problem he and his Thai wife encountered when it comes to finding the right baby food for their son, Roland-Jones founded Peachy Village three years ago to produce baby food products which consist of mainly fruit purée and health snacks.
"I found that Thai parents rarely feed their newborns with dietary supplements," he commented. "In most cases, newborns are breastfed or given baby formula. And when they grow up a bit, they are introduced to solid food."
Roland-Jones's concern clearly mirrors the nutrition-related reality facing Thai families. According to the Thailand Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS) which was conducted by the National Statistical Office and which was a study surrounding children and women's living conditions in Thailand in 2012, it was found that around 16% of kids aged below five years old suffered chronic malnutrition, most of which took place in the country's Northeast, followed by the South.
The survey also revealed that children whose mothers were undereducated were more likely to fall prey to such a physical condition than those whose mothers are properly schooled.
To solve such a challenge in the long run and to change parents' attitudes towards nutrition, Roland-Jones has been working collaboratively with the Department of Nutrition, Mahidol University's Faculty of Public Health, since last year to come up with an approach to educate Thai society at large. And finally, the project entitled Feed for the Future has been launched.
Asst Prof Chatrapa Hudthagosol, certified dietitian and lecturer from the Department of Nutrition, said at last week's press conference that the objective of Feed for the Future is to tackle not just the health of the babies but also that of the mothers.
"Feed for the Future is the first project that is not just baby, but also mother-centred," said Chatrapa. "It stems from the basic principle that if mothers are knowledgeable, there is nothing to worry about regardless of the number of kids in each family."
According to the dietitian, an estimated 40% of Thai children have developmental delay while 30% suffer learning difficulties. All this is in part because they did not receive sufficient nutrients when they were little. A number of fat kids were found to actually fall prey to nutritional deficiencies, especially protein.
"One of the most worrying nutritional issues facing Thai kids is obesity," she said. "This puts them at higher risk of developing diabetes, hypertension, immunity problems, deteriorating health and a lack of self-confidence."
The issue regarding children's diets, added Chatrapa, should not be addressed only when they reach primary or secondary school. Once kids start putting food into their mouths, then it should immediately be highlighted, especially by parents.
"Parents should start thinking what they should do for their kids nutritionally when they reach an age as young as six months old," the nutritionist added.
According to Chatrapa, Feed for the Future targets mothers with children of six month to three years. After discussions with experts from Silpakorn University, the project has been executed in the form of a series of learning materials, comprising four sets of things like booklets and card games designed for new mothers to use, play with and study for four consecutive weeks.
These colourful and easy-to-understand learning materials are designed to equip mothers with nutrition-related knowledge, such as what type of diet a baby should be fed at what age; what type of food a mother should eat; what nutritional practices mothers and babies should follow and so forth.
So far the project has been implemented in three preschool children development centres in Bangkok, namely Wat Pai Tan community, Dhipankara Karunyamitr childcare centre and the Provost Marshal General's Department childcare centre. Training sessions and workshops with the use of the learning materials were arranged for 30 participating mothers to gain some knowledge about nutrition both for themselves and for their children. Then data was collected for three months for post-activity assessment.
After evaluation, according to Chatrapa, mothers who were educated were reported to have better knowledge on what they and their babies should eat especially when they were compared to 15 other mothers in the study's control group who underwent no activities.
The attitudes and the food consumption patterns of both mums and kids also changed. More importantly, some nutritional indicators of mothers, such as their Body Mass Index and waistline after education were lower.
By 2017, the project and instructional materials are expected to be used in over 20 childcare centres countrywide, added the nutritionist.
"For future plans, more childcare staff will be invited to be trained so that they will help follow up and educate mothers in the future," said Chatrapa.
"If the project goes as planned, we believe it would be able to help fix the country's nutritional crisis, lower the incident of non-communicable diseases and in the long run improve the quality of life of Thai people."
Some learning materials used in Feed for the Future.
Asst Prof Chatrapa Hudthagosol explains the learning materials.
