AmeriCares and its Partners Improve Pediatric Nutrition and Health in Vietnam

The soy milk is delicious, and when I drink both cups, I feel full and good.”—Mi Tien, age 5
That’s how five-year-old Mi Tien feels after she receives nutrient-rich soy milk twice a day as a participant in a pediatric nutrition program supported over the past six years by AmeriCares, Abbott and the Abbott Fund to help fight malnutrition in Vietnam.Since enrolling in the program two years ago, Mi Tien has shown impressive height and weight gains, and her parents report she’s much more energetic and active.  Mi was the first in her family of rice farmers from rural Quang Tri province to benefit from the nutrition program.  After seeing how the program has helped their daughter, Mi Tien’s parents have also enrolled her three-year-old brother.While life is much better for many Vietnamese children today than it was just two decades ago, the National Institute of Nutrition reports about one-third of the country’s children under the age of five are stunted as a result of chronic malnutrition, and about 20 percent of children overall  are considered underweight and malnourished. The pre-school based nutrition program – managed by AmeriCares and our partner, Giao Diem Humanitarian Foundation (GDHF) – targets poor children living in rural, agricultural communities because they often face the most significant nutrition and health challenges. Join us in the fight against childhood malnutrition in Vietnam and around the world »

The Pediatric Nutrition Program

 Happy participants in the Vietnam Pediatric Nutrition Program supported by AmeriCares

The Pediatric Nutrition Program, which began as a pilot initiative in 2005 with 372 children, has grown into a comprehensive nutrition and health program that is improving the lives of 3,200 children throughout rural villages in Vietnam’s central highlands region. To date the program has succeeded in reducing the rate of participant malnutrition to just 21 percent, which exceeds the UN Millennium Development Goal target of 25 percent.The program’s primary focus has been to improve the nutrition and overall health of young children aged 12 months to five years old, who are not yet part of government-sponsored elementary school lunch plans. Key components of the program include training sessions for students, teachers, principals, and parents in health, hygiene, and nutrition, provision of multivitamins and pediatric nutritional supplements, and school infrastructure repairs to ensure safe, healthy cooking and learning environments. The children in the Pediatric Nutrition Program are served peanut-fortified soy milk which is prepared daily at local preschool facilities. Each child’s height, weight, and iron levels are carefully monitored throughout the school year.Over the next several years, AmeriCares and GDHF will focus on reducing malnutrition to below 20 percent, primarily by investing additional resources in extremely poor children who appear to exhibit persistent malnutrition despite program enrollment. In addition, a five-year evaluation of the program will help determine whether the success in central and south Vietnam can be replicated and scaled up to improve nutrition elsewhere in Vietnam or other resource-poor countries.For nearly 30 years, AmeriCares has worked around the clock and around the world in 147 countries to restore health and save lives. Wherever people are in desperate need, we are there. Donate Now