Learn how we use evidence-based behaviour change campaigns to improve and save lives in low-income countries.
Learn about how DMI brings together two different worlds: demonstrable scientific practice and creative storytelling.
Location Capacity strengthening, Nutrition
Madagascar, particularly the Southern regions of the country, is currently facing a major food security crisis and has seen high rates of malnutrition, with 40% of children in the country suffering from chronic malnutrition in 2024 (WFP, 2024). Adequate nutrition throughout the life course, including in infancy, childhood, as well as during pregnancy, is a building block for good health and resilience against disease.
Haninaja, meaning “young child food” in Malagasy, is a project working in collaboration with the World Food Programme (WFP) as part of their Madagascar Country Strategic Plan (2024-2028), aiming to address the most pressing nutritional issues and behaviours in the country.
Madagascar
Nutrition – promoting diet diversity and positive infant and young child feeding practices
SBC Formative research report for WFP and partners
This campaign is taking place in the Grand Sud region of Southern Madagascar, starting in August 2023.
Science
Haninaja covers four regions in Southern Madagascar: Anosy, Androy, Atsimo-Andrefana and Atsimo-Atsinanana. These regions are amongst the hardest hit by malnutrition in the country.
To help inform our SBC campaign, we conducted extensive formative research via discussion groups and interviews with key audience community members in the Southern region of Madagascar. The barriers to good nutrition are almost entirely structural: climate, drought, and the cost of living. There were, however, important gaps in knowledge as to what constitutes an “optimal diet”, for example which complementary foods are most appropriate for infants. In addition, strong gender norms influence the distribution of food within households.
Stories
From the formative research, we have been able to identify and prioritise the following messages:
Saturation
This campaign is a collaboration between DMI, WFP and its partners.
The hope is to have knowledge acquired during this research reach beyond the direct beneficiaries of this campaign and into other projects led by our partners.
We are grateful to the World Food Programme and their partners for funding this collaborative initiative.