In 2019, Jacques Niyibizi, a resident of Nyabihu District, was asked by his village mates to offer his home as a day-care facility for preschool children, and he welcomed the idea.
Niyibizi is one of four caregivers who look after up to 15 children in Kabyaza village every day. In Nyabihu there are about 2,000 caregivers, who offer voluntary services in ECD facilities.
At the home-based early childhood development (ECD) centre, the children aged three to five years get a balanced diet, with part of the budget provided by the government and another by the contribution of the parents themselves.
"My colleagues and I are happy to help not only our children but also those of the neighbours. We play with the children to stimulate their brain development and prepare them for school when they turn six," Niyibizi said.
He noted that through what is called the village kitchen (or igikoni cy'umudugudu in Kinyarwanda), parents of the children get to learn how to prepare a balanced meal to ensure that the young ones are well-fed at home too.
The ECD centres are one of the initiatives that were introduced to tackle malnutrition and stunting rates across the country and prepare the kids for school, among other objectives.
In Nyabihu District, there are more than 1,158 home-based ECD facilities looking after about 18,900 children aged three to five years.
At the ECD centres, community health workers are able to track the nutrition status of the children by taking monthly measurements such as of the mid-upper arm circumference (MUAC) and length.
The team of community health workers in Nyabihu conducts home visitations to pregnant mothers to follow up on their pregnancy and ensure that they attend antenatal care (ANC) visits to the health centres to prevent the child's risk of stunting.
On these ANC visits, the expectant women also get iron and folic acid tablets for the pregnancy. These tablets help women prevent anaemia and stunting in babies during pregnancy.
The expectant and breastfeeding women from the low-income categories are given fortified cereal flour called Shisha Kibondo to complement their diet.
During the antenatal visits, women are also taught how to prepare a balanced diet with the available resources.
Nyabihu is one of 13 districts that benefit from the World Bank-sponsored 'Stunting Prevention and Reduction Project' (SPRP), which supports community-based approaches to improve the delivery of high-impact nutrition and health interventions.
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Nyabihu District reduced its child stunting rate from 59 per cent, one of the highest rates in the country, in 2015, to 46 in 2020, according to the Demographic and Health Survey by the National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda (NISR).
The national rate declined from 38 per cent to 33 per cent over the same period. The government's target is to reach 19 per cent in 2024.
"The stunting rate in our district is still high, but our efforts to reduce it significantly are just as relentless. We want to reach as low as 19 per cent in 2024," Nyabihu District's Vice Mayor in charge of social development, Pascal Simpenzwe, said.
"The caregivers and the people who have offered their homes for the ECD activities have contributed a lot to the gains we have recorded so far and we are sure that the host of interventions supported by the government and the communities will yield better results."
Justine Mukamuhire, whose four-year-old son attends the ECD in Kabyaza village, testified to the benefits of the facility.
"He came here when he was two years old. Here, he plays with other children and they always get well fed and they drink milk too," 37-year-old Mukamuhire said.
"We thank the role of the caregivers who take care of our children. Before the ECD centres, the children would spend the day wandering around while we went to the farms. But today, when they learn new things, we are assured that they are safe at the ECD."
