1000 Days of Motherhood

Recently I returned from the far reaches of eastern Zambia which borders Malawi. The Eastern Province is now home to the largest number of our Lifeplayers in Zambia.

Our Lifeplayer MP3s are being integrated into three initiatives – a widespread agricultural project of COMACO where cooperative farmer groups to listen to Farm Talk; a pre-school and parenting project of the Ministry of Education; and they’re also now being used by CARE International Zambia.

Up to 20% of children in the province suffer from under-nutrition. The ones most impacted are under the age of five. In response, CARE have established nutrition centers to help reduce the high rates of stunting, especially in younger children. Central to CARE’s strategy of addressing the first 1000 critical days of motherhood is the Bushes That Grow audio programme which is loaded on to our Lifeplayers. The content is produced by the National Food and Nutrition Commission of the Ministry of Health.

In the Eastern Province alone, CARE have established 15 nutrition centers in the Lundazi district and Chadiza has seven. The initiative started out in 71 villages and has now doubled to 142, and is continuing to expand given its popularity.

On Friday mornings, women’s listener groups in each of the villages comprised of about 20 mothers, gather to listen and discuss Bushes That Grow.  Groups have a leader or facilitator and use a radio listening guide created in the local language, Nyanja, to support them. The women say that listening in a group is better than trying to listen on their own when because they may not own a radio or have fresh batteries. Like elsewhere we’ve seen in Zambia, women enjoy learning together and discussing what they’ve learned and how they’ll use the new knowledge. Women also appreciate being able to listen again to points they may not have understood on the Lifeplayer’s playback feature.

These rural women are mainly farmers and a significant number have not attended school. Rates of illiteracy are high, which makes audio learning the most apprioriate and cost-effective way in which to reach them.   And just like all the other womens’ groups we’ve met, they want to learn more – like English and financial literacy skills.

Many of the groups are now getting too large and more Lifeplayers are needed. We would greatly appreciate your continued support in helping to provide them.

Next month we’ll be back in Zambia where Lifeline will be undertaking another distribution of Lifeplayers in the Eastern Province, in collaboration with the local Ministry of Education.  What’s so exciting about the next phase of this initiative is that while the pre-schoolers are listening to their interactive content, their mothers will have their own Lifeplayer, and be able to listen to the 1,000 Days of Motherhood content. 

In an urban area, children are at pre-school all day while their mothers are working.  By contrast, in rural areas mothers typically don’t work outside the home and instead of dropping children off and leaving, they wait. This is a great opportunity for mothers to learn, and provides an added incentive to bring their children to a pre-school.  

While these mothers love listening to content about health and nutrition, they also find content on farming skills and information useful, as most rural women are also farmers. Being part of a listening group affords mothers the opportunity to listen to some of the pre-recorded Farm Talk programmes from our other partner, COMACO, in addition to the 1,000 Days content. 

When we launched the 1,000 Days pilot project nearly two years ago, we didn't know what would happen, but hoped that it would grow. We’re delighted that the initiative has taken on a life of its own! More content is being created and further listening groups are starting. We're pleased that CARE Zambia has procured additional Lifeplayers in significant numbers to extend the programme into further rural listening groups.

Including other relevant educational content on topics such as farming and financial literacy only increases the impact that our Lifeplayers are having on the women we’re able to reach. We look forward to bringing you more stories and photographs after our visit to Zambia next month.