Adequate nutrition is a prerequisite for attaining good health, quality of life, and national productivity. Undernutrition has been and continues to be a serious public-health problem in Bangladesh. Bangladesh is placed in the bottom 25% of the Global Hunger Index ranking, indicating that the country is expected to face a huge risk in the context of food price-hike. To cope with the high prices of food, alongside reducing portion-sizes, 22% of families also reduced health expenditure, which is likely to have impacted on health.
The diets of the majority people in Bangladesh like many other developing countries are usually dominated by staple foods such as rice, wheat and in some cases maize. High costs made healthy foods like vegetables and fresh fruits unaffordable to Bangladesh’s large number of consumers. However these are mainstream calculations of nutrition and ignore the food intake of the poor people which includes micronutrient foods such as fruits, leafy green vegetables, fish, egg, milk etc.
The prevalence of underweight among under-five children in 1989-1990 was more than 65%. Although it came down to 47% in 2000, little change has been observed since then. The annual rate of reduction in underweight required to achieve the nutrition target of Millennium Development Goal (MDG) 1 is 1.36 percentage points while the current rate is 1.27 percentage points per year. This low rate of reduction in the prevalence of underweight makes it unlikely for the country to achieve the nutrition target of MDG 1. However, even if we achieve the target, the prevalence of underweight will still be unacceptably high. Furthermore, 43% of under-five children are still stunted that accounts for more than 0.5 million children with severe acute malnutrition (SAM) in Bangladesh. These children who are suffering from various forms and degrees of undernutrition are at a high risk of death or severe impairment of growth and development.
Hunger: Charity or Right
JAAGO is working towards breaking the cycle of poverty through education among thousands of underprivileged community children. Given the fact “Underprivileged”, these children and their family are unable to meet the challenge of their daily bread. Hence, the providing proper nutrition for their growth is an extreme luxury for them. As the statistics show that the price hike has an influence in the Bangladeshi food habit, it has an impact on JAAGO’s goal of feeding all the students belonging to all 11 schools across Bangladesh.
JAAGO works for the betterment in remote locations like Bandarban where the children come to school climbing 700ft hills. In areas like this food is the biggest motivation to bring the students to the school although most of us can’t even imagine the misery like them. Besides, the struggle of logistic challenges is real for of reaching out to these areas. Even after all these odds our students are provided with a weekly healthy meal with the support of donors and sponsors. At this point the kind support and donation from our supporters and well-wishers are the hopes of light to ensure the right of nutrition for the little beautiful souls. The two most constant donors of healthy meal for the students are “Thrive” and “Charity Right Bangladesh”. Among the 11 schools of JAAGO, Thrive provides weekly nutrition boost to Banani, Gaibandha and Dinajpur schools. On the other hand, Charity Right Bangladesh is supporting the JAAGO Rayer Bazar School.
Spread love and laughter
Often the well-wishers of JAAGO come to visit and share the warmth of their love with the students of JAAGO. In last few months among many of the donors the “Noor House” people spent a day with the students from Banani, Dhaka. They brought healthy snacks for all the students. Meanwhile, the service learning team from a very renowned school AISD, invited over the students at their campus. There they served a healthy meal for a day to the JAAGO students.
Thank You Note!
We would like to take the opportunity to thank you on behalf of JAAGO Foundation for your contribution in fighting the poverty and achieving the right of nutrition for thousands of children in Bangladesh. Your contribution means a lot to us. The financial support from your side would help us in fulfilling our mission of ensuring a healthy generation for a better world. With the funds donated by you and other people, we would be able to transform the lives of many children and their families.We believe your kindness is equipping the JAAGO students to break the cycle of poverty in the best possible way.
We are really grateful for your support. The support from generous people like you is the reason for our survival. Our success is majorly dependent on the support that you people provide us. It’s because of you that we are able to deliver our best to the community.
Thank you once again for making our mission a success. We will look forward for your support in future as well!
Nutritional challenges in countries like Bangladesh can begin from the moment of conception to birth. The cycle can continue for a longer period of time. Low birth weight, limited or no access to quality food and poor dietary practices has long-lasting consequences, such as diminished mental ability and learning capacity that may lead to poor school performance.
In Bangladesh, more than 9.5 million children are stunted, a symptom of malnutrition. Children suffering from stunting may never reach their full possible height nor their full cognitive potential. Rates of malnutrition in the country are among the worst in the world. This is a bigger issue for women in Bangladesh, more than 50% of women suffer from chronic energy deficiencies that hamper their ability to reach their full potential. Improving nutrition will have a critical impact on not only survival but physical and cognitive development and productivity. Good nutrition is comprised of satisfactory quality and the quantity of intake, which is a basic human right as well as essential input for economic development and progress.
Helping Kids Thrive
One of the greatest factors for malnutrition among children in Bangladesh is household food insecurity, this is why JAAGO implements the ‘Healthy Living’ program as it ensures that our students have access to at least one nutritious meal a day. JAAGO is delighted to partner with Thrive, an organisation that aims to provide healthy and nutritious meals to hungry children in the poorest parts of the world, to help feed the students at our schools. Thrive and JAAGO has worked together to determine the needs of our students are. Studies show that children in Bangladesh suffer from high rates of micronutrient deficiencies, specifically zinc, vitamin A and iron deficiencies. Therefore, Thrive has complied foods that will address these concerns such as Banana that contain potassium, manganese, vitamin B6, vitamin C, vitamin A, fiber, potassium, iron and biotin which has benefits for the heart, digestion, energy, bone strength, brain power and vision. Thrive provides food to 5 of our schools. Very recently, they have started operating in our Dinajpur and Gaibandha schools as well. Charity Rights also provides food to our kids once a week and we welcome more partners and donors who will help us feed our children!
A Fun Day with Nutritious Food!
At JAAGO we believe in giving our children the most nutrient rich foods available in order to combat the rise in micronutrient deficiencies. Therefore, in the winter season when there is a surplus of vegetable crops we host a ‘Vegetable Festival’ teaching them how to cook with the vegetables and making khichuri, a Bangladeshi dish. The kids enjoy a fun day with dancing, singing and finish with enjoying the khichuri they made. This allows our kids to learn important life skills regarding food such as how to make healthy meals and clean and prepare vegetables.
Thank You Note
Being a nonprofit organisation we always look for support from our donors and other organisations to ensure that we are giving our children the opportunities they deserve. We would like to express our gratitude to all the donors supporting this project, allowing us to give our children the best chance at a better life. Food will fuel our students and allow them to achieve their dreams.
In Bangladesh, malnutrition rates are significantly high, where a majority of the victims are children studying in preschool. About 54% of the children amongst 9.5 million children have stunted growth, 56% suffer from underweight and above 17% are wasted due to lacking in nutrition. According to a latest study, more than half of the children within the nation’s population are unable to reach their full potential due to acute malnutrition.
The children at JAAGO come from destitute backgrounds and often have to rely on a single meal a day at home for nutrition and energy. At JAAGO, it had been observed that the children are often exhausted, sleepy or are unable to concentrate in their classes the entire day. This not only hinders their ability to display their full potential but also affects their academic prospective.
Keeping in mind the condition from which these children come from, JAAGO had introduced the concept of nutrition boost, where the children are provided with healthy snacks that are high in vitamins and minerals.
Nutrition Boosts for All
In orderto ensure a well-balanced diet, the children are now being provided with a tiffin box containing bananas, a glass of milk and a pastry filled with savoury vegetables. Previously, the children were given lesser items as a part of their nutrition boost. After bringing in a dietician, who had assessed the condition of the children, it was deduced that the children required a wholesome meal in order for them to sustain through the entire four to five hours of school time.
On the other hand, we have introduced a nutrition dense food supplement once a week called MoniMix for the 3500 children in our 12 schools. This food supplement has slowly become a favourite for the children as it tastes like candy to them, but is infused with various types of minerals and vitamins. The supplement contains micronutrient blend of iron, vitamin C, vitamin A, Zinc and Folic Acid. Some of the benefits which is noted for MoniMix are that it enhances physical growth and brain development, improves concentration in various activities and increases concentration levels, develops memory functions and learning ability, develops a resistance towards diseases, creates appetite and reduces infections.
With the recent additions to the nutrition boost project, the budget has increased to feed these children. We are relying on the contributions of the donors and well-wishers in order to maintain this healthy and wholesome nutrition meals for the children.
Thank You Note
JAAGO Foundation would like to express our gratitude to the donors who are allowing our children to dream with a full stomach now. We seek your help in continuing to feed these children. In the words of Mother Teresa, “If you can't feed a hundred people, then feed just one.”
To stay healthy and maintain a healthy weight, children need to be physically active and eat the right amount of nutrients to balance the energy they use. Staying healthy physically can help you stay healthy emotionally too. If you're eating the right food and keeping fit, your body will be strong and help you to cope with stress and also fight illness. Eating well and exercising is very necessary in the early stage of any child life, as it helps to develop them mentally and physically.
At JAAGO Foundation School, we are providing free of cost education towards 3500 marginalized community children in government’s English version curriculum. These students belong from a background where education is a luxury they can not afford. At JAAGO, these students receives support of education materials such as books, notebooks, uniforms, shoes, school bags, stationery and many more. With your precious support, we provide nutritious foods to the students of our school. Thanks for believing in our cause of giving a healthy childhood towards these underprivileged children.
Great Things Occur With Joint Effort
Bangladesh is a country of emerging economy where millions of children are deprived of basic human needs. Food is the most needed basic right for any human, whereas millions of children in our country are suffering with malnutrition, growing up stunted because of poor nutrition. At JAAGO Schools while catering 3500 students, we try to provide food towards all the children. But due to limitation of funding, often it doesn’t become possible to provide in every schools throughout the year. Thus, we welcome different organization to join us to defeat the challenge of malnutrition. We believe with the joint effort, we can provide a healthy nutrition boost towards the children of our JAAGO Schools.
Healthy Food Habit Helps to Bring Out The Best
Research suggests that diets high in trans and saturated fats can negatively impact learning and memory, nutritional deficiencies early in life can affect the cognitive development of school-aged children. Whereas access to nutrition improves students cognition, concentration, and energy levels. With your valuable support, we are providing nutritious foods towards the children of JAAGO, enabling them to grow with required nutrition boost.
Thank You Note
Thank you for giving JAAGO Foundation and other children a chance at a brighter future! We are so grateful for your incredible support. We are grateful to individuals, corporate, donors and supporters for their generous support on “Feed the Children” project.
We requests to all our well-wishers to continue their love and support by providing their irreplaceable support to this cause, we can ensure each child can overcome malnutrition with the help of JAAGO’s Feed The Children project.
Bangladesh is now rising into middle income country; despite of this, millions of children grow up stunted because of severe malnutrition. Malnutrition in children is a major concern in Bangladesh which causing deaths and diseases in children. The economic consequences of Bangladesh’s malnutrition problem are profound, resulting in lost productivity and reduced intellectual and learning capacity.
In Bangladesh, malnutrition is caused by several factors. The direct causes are diseases and inadequate intake of food. The primary causes of malnutrition include the inability of households to grow and/or purchase sufficient food for their needs and child-care practices. We are generously thankful to your little donations that is helping JAAGO to fight against malnutrition and trying to provide healthy life to the 3500 underprivileged children.
Different Stakeholders Come Together to Fight for Malnutrition Children
Almost one third of all deaths among children in Bangladesh are caused by severe malnutrition. Child malnutrition occurs due to deficiency of vitamin A that causes night-blindness in children which is very high in Bangladesh. Most rural children run a high risk of vitamin A deficiency because of inadequate dietary intake of the vitamin, due largely to poverty, and partly due to poor eating habits resulting from ignorance. For this reason, JAAGO Foundation took an initiative to provide good nutrition food to these 3500 children as they are from economical underprivileged family background .With the support of other different stakeholders and individual supporters who came on board to help 520 children who are fighting against malnutrition and for the rest of the children, JAAGO tries to feed them with your generous donations.
Appreciable Impact of JAAGO Children
With the help of generous donation from individual supporters like you and other organization, today, 3500 underprivileged children at JAAGO School from the rural parts of Bangladesh are enriched with proper food and nutrition. As a result, each of them will be given the opportunity to explore and push through their maximum abilities and in the longer run these children can be highly skilled on what they are good at.
Thank You Note
Thank you for giving JAAGO Foundation and JAAGO children a chance to create a brighter future! We are so grateful for your incredible support. We are grateful to individuals, corporate, donors and supporters for their generous support on “Feed the Children” project. We appreciate that you give us your continuous love and support for this cause.
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