Overcome through Cross-Sector Method and Consistently

BRUNOTO UNTUK KOMPAS

An infant sits next to his mother on a raised walkway in front of their house in Adat village, Pulau Tiga district, Asmat regency, Papua. Dozens of infants in Asmat regency died in December 2017 from malnutrition and infectious diseases because they had not received basic immunization.

JAKARTA, KOMPAS — The cause of malnutrition is lack of nutritious food intake and infection. Therefore, nutritional disorders can only be overcome jointly in a cross-sector method. In addition to opening access to health services, there must also be access to food, clean water and healthy latrines.

This was disclosed by professor of nutrition science at the School of Public Health School, University of Indonesia, Endang L. Achadi, who is also a member of the Food Security Council, in Jakarta, Tuesday (29/1/2019). If there are symptoms of a decrease in nutritional status, short-and long-term efforts must be carried out. For the short-term, the health team works with local community organizations and community leaders -- if necessary there is assistance from the Indonesian Military (TNI) -- to go to the field to provide food, health services and medicines, while providing information on nutrition and healthy lifestyles. This is done repeatedly until the nutritional problem is resolved.

In the long-term, the efforts are made to change behavior through education, agricultural guidance for food security, technique to make wells, healthy latrines, and so on. This needs to involve other agencies, such as those dealing with agriculture, livestock and public works. Education is carried out with community organizations, community leaders and local cadres who are able to provide examples of healthy lifestyles. "This must be done consistently. To change behavior requires a long time," he said.

If the local government does not have enough funds, the central government needs to help with special allocations, such as disaster management. This should be followed by a reconstruction-rehabilitation program, in this case efforts to overcome poverty and ensure healthy behavior for the community.

In a seminar in Jakarta on Tuesday, Doddy Izwardy, director of community nutrition at the Health Ministry, said that aside from health services, nutrition issues were also influenced by access to clean water and sanitation. If there is no clean water and poor sanitation, the living environment will be unhealthy and vulnerable to disease.

Moreover, there is a need for quality food that is easily accessible to people in many regions. This cross-sectoral effort is contained in the Community Movement for Healthy Living (Germas). Germas needs to be intensified by all parties so as to reduce the number of stunting children.

Sago development

In an effort to improve food security, head of the program subdivision of Papua Plantation Office, Gatot Budi Santoso, said that his party has implemented a sago plantation land management program in three regencies covering 700 hectares. The total budget being disbursed reaches Rp 3.2 billion. "The sago plantation area is 300 hectares in Keerom, 200 hectares in Nabire and 200 hectares in Jayapura," he said. Land arrangement is carried out in the form of a planting pattern with a distance between 8-9 meters to produce productive sago trees.

At present, the sago land area in 14 regencies in Papua reaches 35,395 hectares with 2,729 farmers, and sago production is 28,576 tons per year. "So far, sago trees in Papua have grown wild. This needs to be

changed through socializing the importance of sago consumption as a local food substitute for rice for health and economic value," he said.

Meanwhile, Maluku Governor Said Assagaff said Monday (28/01/2019) that he would instruct relevant agencies to remap the nutritional conditions of children in Maluku. The nutrition handling will be evaluated. Said acknowledged, the handling of health problems in Maluku has not yet proceeded as expected due to the condition of the archipelago. Many areas cannot be served by health workers yet.

The effort to provide health workers, in this case doctors, is carried out by the West Papuan Provincial Government by opening the Medical School of the University of Papua in Sorong regency. "Every year, we budget Rp 24 billion for the medical school. This is one solution to answer the lack of doctors in West Papua," said Yonadap Trogea, a member of the West Papuan Legislative Council (DPRD) from the Special Autonomy Faction.

In East Nusa Tenggara, a number of regents and provincial governments make various efforts to overcome malnutrition. One of them is the food-intensive program in Timor Tengah Utara regency. Rice recipients for poor households are required to expand arable land every year. There is also revolving fund assistance for villages to develop farms or livestock. The East Nusa Tenggara Provincial Government is also developing household-scale kelor (Moringa) farming to supply industries to improve nutrition and welfare of the population. ( ATK/ E22/ FRN/ FLO/ SEM)