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From Timothy Olanrewaju
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has urged the Borno State government to sustain its contributions to the Child Nutrition Fund (CNF), a special funding platform to tackle severe acute malnutrition in the northeast.
The Officer-in-Charge, UNICEF Chief of Maiduguri Field Office, Mr Joseph Senesie, gave the push on Wednesday, July 16, in Maiduguri while handing over 2,254 cartons of Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) to the Borno State government.
He stressed that sustaining the tempo of funding to the CNF this year will boost the campaign to protect the most vulnerable children in the state.
Senesie said UNICEF delivered the 2,254 cartons of Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) to the Borno State government to address severe acute malnutrition and the nutritional needs of affected children.
“With this support, thousands of children affected by the most threatening form of malnutrition now have a renewed chance to survive and thrive,” he declared.
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He said the nutritional food was procured through the CNF.
The Borno State Commissioner of Health and Human Services, Prof Baba Mallam Gana, who received the items on behalf of the state government, warned people against reselling the nutritional food. Both the government and UNICEF had in April decried the alarming rate of theft, diversion, and reselling of nutritional foods donated to the state by international partners.
“We ask you (parents) in the name of God not to sell them. It is for the benefit of your children, given to them free,” he said.
He commended UNICEF for the donation. He said over two million children in the northeast are facing malnutrition.
“The issue of malnutrition is a big problem, not just in Borno State, but northeast Nigeria. For example, in the northeast, we have over two million children who are suffering malnutrition, out of which half a million are facing acute malnutrition,” he disclosed.
