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The field work comprised a compilation of the anthropometric data at the dispensary, an inventory of available food in Chikal, an investigation of food habits, and a study of PTV. Moreover, some chemical analyses were made.
Objectives
When the children are being weighed at the dispensary the weight is noted both in a book which is usually kept in the childs home and on a form at the dispensary. Thanks to this system figures were available at the dispensary about the weight and the age of the child for many years back. I registered the most important data for each child i.e. the latest weighing and all weighings in the time June-August, 1987. The registrations were compiled in a computer, and different diagrams were created. In order to study the differences between children born in different seasons of the year, some diagrams were created on this basis.
Results
Objectives
The investigation of the food supply was initiated during the investigation of food patterns. When I collected data about their diet I also asked which ingredients were used. For leaves, fruits etc. the plant of origin was specified. The information about plants that give food is compiled in Appendix 3.
The collection of information started off with the name of the crop in Hausa, and sometimes also in French, and with the use as a food. With the assistance of "Lexique de noms vernaculaires de plantes du Niger" (B. Peyre de Fabreques)
and expert help from persons in charge at Projet Tapis Vert in Chikal, the Latin names could be found and sometimes also the English ones. Some English names have been found in EDEN foundations "Common Name List of Potential `Dry Farming' Plants" elaborated in collaboration with Kew Gardens in England.
The information about sowing, cultivation and harvesting of the plants that had been introduced for cultivation in the dry season and for some other main crops was given to me by some collaborators in PTV. I got some further information on plants common in their diet from the local inhabitants. For other plants there are only some summary facts available. This applies especially to the plants harvested at times of the year other than the period of the investigation.
The plants in Appendix 3 have been divided into groups according to common divisions in food tables: Vegetables, fruits and berries, roots and cereals. In the group vegetables, leafy vegetables have been separated into a group of their own as it is a very big and important group. The division was by no means self-evident. Where is the border between fruit and vegetable (for instance aubergine, tomato)? Vegetables is a more functional expression while the others are mere biological expressions, and the differences between the diets in Sweden and in Chikal are expressed in the fact that melon is a vegetable in Chikal and a fruit in Sweden, while maize is a cereal in Chikal and a vegetable in Sweden. One further problem is the fact that some plants are used in different ways. Cowpeas give both peas and leaves, the most important contribution from the baobab are not their fruits but their leaves, etc. Within the groups, the names have been put in alphabetical order after their Latin names.
"Millet" is a name which (like "hirs" in Swedish) often has been used for many different products from different types of grass (and other plants) in dry areas. In this report millet will be used only for Pennisetum glaucum (App. 3:E2).
As an alternative to millet in the diet, sorghum is used (Sorghum spp) (App. 3:E3).
Results
Objectives
Before the inquiry was made in the households, I had to learn what the different ingredients and dishes were in Chikal.
A prerequisite for making a food pattern investigation is a basic knowledge of what normally is included in the diet. Therefore, I started my time in Chikal going through together with some persons from the village, the different existing dishes, how they were cooked, which ingredients were used etc. These data were completed while the food pattern investigation was run. Ingredients, dishes, fruits etc. are listed alphabetically in Hausa in Appendix 1, and a more thorough description of the dishes is to be found in Appendix 2.
The diet investigation was run as a so called 24-hour recall-inquiry. The interviews were made for whole households and not for individuals and they only dealt with what type of food that had been consumed, not amount. There was no information available in the villages or with the authorities about the households and where they were to be found. The interpreter was given the task to chose households in the village as representative as possible according to his judgement. In this way seven households were visited each day during seven days, or totally 49 interviews were made.
I chose whole households instead of individuals as my opinion was that the difference in diet between the different members of a household was small and that it under the circumstances it was difficult to get correct information from individuals.
The inquiry was made in Chikal, where the central village, Chinyassou, had five visits each day, and one of the four surrounding villages had two visits each day. The villages Dourgouna, Lokoko and Illela had visits during two of the investigation days, while the smallest village Tsoloa was visited only one day.
The questions were asked of the persons who were at home during the visit. Sometimes a mother with small children; sometimes several women together and, on several occasions, men who had come home from the fields. At the interview I asked questions about the persons in the household and the age of the children. I asked what meals they had had yesterday and about the contents of the meals. Leading questions were asked as little as possible, and they were asked from a blank paper. I asked about the ingredients in the different dishes and all notes were made in Hausa (the local language) to avoid misunderstandings. Also I asked about snacks: if the children got something extra and if they had had some fruit or something else during the day.
During the second half of the inquiry in the home I asked questions about the stove, as I saw broken stoves in the households that I had visited.
Some samples of the national dish fura and of the ingredient daudawa have been analysed as to content of water, ash and protein. The samples were transported frozen to Sweden and were analysed at the Chemical Center in Lund.
The water content was determined using a drying oven at 105deg.C over night. To determine the ash content, the sample was put into a cold muffle oven, which was heated during the night. The content of protein was determined according to Kjeldahl using a Kjeltec (registered trade mark for Tecator AB). The fat content was analysed using a Foss-let.
Results
Objectives
The analytical method uses different goal descriptions. Since it is a nutritional analysis, nutritional goals and objectives has to be described first.
To speak about nutritional goals might be unfamiliar. Probably most people would state that eating food is one of their nutritional goals, preferably every day and several times a day. This definition of goals is not stringent enough for a scientific analysis. Therefore, the following goal description has been drawn up:
The nutritional goal is that everybody should be able to:
meet his or her needs of necessary nutrients.
To reach this goal, important objectives can be stated.
One might divide the prime nutritional goal, as stated above, into the following four objectives:
- to acquire the food (to buy or to sow/cultivate/harvest),
- to store the food (in silos, warehouses, jars),
- to process/prepare the food (to ferment cassava, three-stone-stoves)
- to ingest the food (frequency of meals, bulkiness, size of portions).
Please note that these objectives do not include anything about specific nutrients as does the supreme nutritional goal. Instead they talk about securing the food intake, and an analysis of meeting the needs for nutrients must be done from the point of view of the supreme nutritional goal.
The analysis will be carried out in two steps. First the goal description of the project will be analysed from the viewpoint of the nutritional objectives as above. Are the nutritional objectives considered in the goal description of PTV?
Then the activities executed in the project will be related to the nutritional objectives. Are these activities adequate tools to reach these objectives?
Results
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