Meet Okonkwo Sunday- CS SUN Nigeria

Conducted: 30th September 2016

Interviewee: Okonkwo Sunday- CS SUN Secretariat Nigeria. Project Manager

Section1: Identifying examples to share at LR Rwanda

Q1. Which of these is your strongest area of intervention? Why? Tell me about your best practice example?

Policy: In 2001 the National Food and Nutrition Policy was developed with a goal to reduce malnutrition and increase nutrition in Nigeria focus on the vulnerable group of children under five and also women of reproductive age, but the policy was not implemented much was not done and it actually expired and requiring review.

But along the line Health sector, being one of the sectors in the nutrition landscape or framework …(they) decided to pick up this document, pick up part of the nutrition policy and developed the strategic plan known as the National Strategic Plan of Action for Nutrition. The document was designed to run from 2014 to 2019. It was actually approved by the NEC, National Executive Council in Nigeria one of the highest policy making bodies in the country…and it was also endorsed at the National Council of Health…supposed to be council of all Commissioners of health cut across Nigeria’s 36 states and the Federal capital.

When the CSA came up (was established), we found out that this document was very good because the goal was to reduce malnutrition and improve nutrition among this vulnerable group. It also targets for example reducing [..…]. In 2013 National Demographic Health Survey put the stunting rate of Nigeria at… and so that document said it would reduce stunting by 20% by 2019 if fully implemented, it also said that it would reduce micronutrient deficiency by 15% increase exclusive breast feeding to 50% from 17 %.

So the document was well developed, had specific targets, had priority areas, had strategies. And the strategies .…..included advocacy, resource mobilization, monitoring an evaluation….

The body…. was able to assess the fund known as the PANFA fund… a sub grant we got from Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation…having seen that this document was good…we decided to raise a voice for the implementation of that particular policy known as the National Strategic Plan of Action for Nutrition which was drawn from the Nation Food and Nutrition Policy….

Advocacy around policy was targeted at 1. Ensured implementation of that document, 2. Ensured the cooperation of funding for implementation by the Ministry of Health and also other line sectoral ministries.
The best practices we applied was we needed to have this plan summarised in such a way that policy makers would be able to read, understand and know the benefits of it because it is a costed plan and it specifically slated the amount of money that would be required to implement it…

One of the key things we did is that we summarized the document…reduced it from 74 to 8 pages, bringing out the key points. We also went further to develop Q&A from the document ….a form of fact sheet that brings out salient points that when policy makers see it, it is easier for them to know what ought to be done and, incorporated the specific asks for what they should do…….

We started by creating awareness around the document because even though it was produced at the national level, at the state level the awareness of the existence of this policy or strategic plan was zero, in the three states where we picked as pilot states. But as at July… when we did a survey to measure the level of awareness among policy makers and key stakeholders it increased from about 0% up to over 56% of those who were interviewed.

We now also adopted our strategy for the policy. We decided to call for high level meetings were deliberations are made around the challenges of malnutrition and presented the strategic plan as a ready made solution or pathway to fixing the problems.

Within it one of the key things we do is we try to get the governors wivese, from each of the states. They are made key notes speakers in that particular meeting. We also have cut across the line ministries around nutrition-Ministry of Health, Agriculture, Water Resources. The governors wives present a paper on malnutrition and the strategies to overcome it and we get Agric: and the rest ( of line ministries) to make presentations on mainstreaming… nutrition in Agric, mainstreaming nutrition into education.

At the end of the day they come up with action plans on steps they will take to ensure that this document is implemented. During those meetings we get commitments from these high level policy makers….. to domesticate the document and also cost them.

I am glad to say in the states we worked we have been able to get them to domesticate the document they have also developed their own state specific documents….targeted at reducing malnutrition.

Q2. Which is your second strongest area of intervention? Why? Tell me about your best practice example?

Data collection and sharing: At the inception of the project one of the key things that we did was to map our stakeholders and do a situation anaylsis. We got a consultant to do a situation analysis and desk study on the existing data and we were able to get a document called “the level of malnutrition among women and children at the national level and the three focal states”. We were able to bring to the fore some of this data.

We called stakeholders to correct the initial draft before it was finalized and we had a dissemination meeting bringing policy makers at the national and at the district levels. In attendance were top government functionaries [….] we used that opportunity to advocate to them on the need to do something on malnutrition in their states.

In all our meetings we try to engage the media. We do press releases on the key findings on the survey that was conducted. We also have this document on or website.

We also developed scorecards. We looked at the policy and we found out that for you to hold them accountable we should be able to measure the level of implementation of these policies. For example in Nigeria they are supposed to have Maternal, child and newborn week twice every year…… so the scorecards focus on these key activities. We went to the states we ensured that they had the buy in to the tool that they should use to measure their implementation…It was used to collect information from them….and at the end of the day they compared state by state….

We wanted to create healthy competition among the states. We also incuded some of the call for actions they are supposed to take to mitigate… to bridge the gaps that became obvious as a result of the scorings they had.…

Findings were disseminated, the scorecards were given to them… to use them as advocacy tools.

We brought together our state chapters of CSOs to train them on how to use these scorecards to engage with the policy makers and implementers of the programmes…to ensure that they see the need for them to do more….

NOTE: sit an was done in 2015

Section 2: Expectations of the LR Process

Q1. What do you expect to get out of the learning route experience from the participants appointed by your CSA?

The Number one expectation we have is learning from what has happened in Rwanda…. what has worked….the kinds of interventions that have really yielded better results both for Rwanda and other CSAs at the learning route. We will want to learn from them such that when we come back we could implement some of their best practices both at national and also at the local level. …for Nigeria for example we have beautiful documents. We have the will to do some things but one of the key challenges we have over here is implementation of these plans.

There is a saying “were your treasure is there your heart will also be.”
We would also want to learn how the CSAs (from other countries) are working….

Q2. How do you plan to use what you have learned (directly or indirectly) from this experience when you return?

We expect a report from them (delegates). Depending on what they learn….it is something that requires creating an avenue where a training will be done to others. Apart from the national body we have tried to create state chapters……some coalitions have their own coordinators. They exist as a coalition at the state level but they are also linked to the national alliance. At national level base don their report we will look at what they have presented and pick things… what they have learned…some of the best practices we can adopt them replicate them both and national and state level.

Q3. What do you think the CSA could/should do to ensure an enabling learning environment before (supporting participants in sharing about the CSA) and after (supporting the participants in sharing and disseminating the learning with the Alliance CSOs)?

We expect them to prepare their mind to learn and encourage the other CSAs at local level to implement some of the key things that are beneficial, and help us promote the local CSAs and work towards improving nutrition. We will brief them on how serious it is and tell them that we expect to learn from them.

Section 3: Communication among CSAs

Q1. Are you engaging with other CSAs? (If yes) How? Benefits?

Outside the communication is not formal....I would say the communication we have been having is in country…..(recording not audible)

Q2. If Participants at the LR agree that communication between CSAs would be beneficial what advise would you give us to help establish channels of communication for CSAs to continue sharing and learning from each other?

Skype…Facebook, twitter account where we could follow each other….tweet what’s happening....for proper discussions virtual meetings would go along way to help relationships and communication among CSAs.

Q3. Advantages/disadvantages

The advantage of linking with other CSAs outside Nigeria. Since it is Africa you will find out that there are similar challenges. For some CSAs they may have taken some key steps that helped them to overcome some of those challenges…(for Nigeria) the issue of having the governors wife has created some access for us….I think also they (other CSAs) can learn from us as well as we can learn from them.

Q1. To make the learning experience enjoyable and fulfilling what innovative ways can you think of to share your best practices? Why?

…..I would say the best way to communicate could be documentary ….audio stuff….looking at what has worked, best practices….some of the developed materials…policy briefs summaries of key documents from various countries….

Q2. What materials (posters, documentary, audio) have you found useful in the past for learning and sharing knowledge? Why?