Nutrition-sensitive Agricultural Interventions for Ethiopia
Condition: Dietary Modification; Health Behavior
MeSH terms: Hypersensitivity
Study type: Interventional

Summary: 
      This study aims at evaluating the impact of integrating nutrition sensitive behavioral change
      communication (BCC) in the context of increased household production of chicken and eggs on
      women and children diet.
    

Detailed description: 
      The Agriculture to Nutrition (ATONU) Project, led by the Food, Agriculture and Natural
      Resources Policy Analysis Network (FANRPAN), aims to develop, implement, and evaluate
      nutrition-sensitive interventions within the context of existing agricultural programs with
      the goal of improving the nutritional status of women of reproductive age and young children,
      particularly in the first 1000 days of life. Specifically, ATONU will implement a nutrition
      sensitive intervention in collaboration with the ACGG Program. ACGG is evaluating the
      agricultural productivity of high-producing chicken genotypes in Ethiopia and will be
      providing 20-30 chickens to small-scale chicken-producing households for an 18-month on-farm
      evaluation. These households will also be provided with regular technical input on good
      chicken production practices, and ACGG investigators will aim to reach women as well as men
      in participating households.

      ATONU will implement an additional nutrition-sensitive intervention among ACGG households
      that will use behavior change communication (BCC) to encourage consumption of chicken
      products (meat and eggs); good water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) practices in poultry
      production; use of income from sale of chicken products to improve nutrition; empowerment of
      women in decision-making around chicken production and sale; and home gardening of
      nutrient-dense vegetables to improve dietary quality within the household. Qualitative work
      is supporting development of this intervention.

      ACGG's intervention to increase chicken production may improve the nutritional status of
      women and children through increasing access to chicken meat and eggs for household
      consumption and empowering women by giving them access to income, which could be used for
      purchase of other nutrient-dense foods. However, increasing production and income alone may
      not necessarily translate into improved diets or nutritional outcomes. ATONU's intervention
      will specifically encourage the use of chicken products and income to provide nutritious
      diets for women of reproductive age, emancipated minors and young children through extensive
      nutrition behavior change communication. Further, recognizing that lack of availability of
      nutrient-dense foods in local markets may be an important barrier to a diverse and nutritious
      diet, the home gardening component of ATONU's intervention seeks to increase the availability
      of nutrient-dense vegetables at household level.

      The ACGG program is operating in diverse agroecologies in Ethiopia. Within its target areas,
      the program listed villages in which chicken production was an important activity and, from
      this list, randomly selected villages in which to implement its intervention. In a subset of
      these ACGG villages, ATONU will implement its intervention. As a result, there will be two
      groups of ACGG villages: those receiving only the poultry production intervention, and those
      receiving the poultry production intervention coupled with ATONU's nutrition-sensitive
      intervention. Allocation of ACGG villages to one of these two groups will be done randomly.
      Investigators will evaluate the nutritional impact of these two interventions among
      smallholder chicken-producing households in Ethiopia. Specifically, investigators will use
      the two groups of villages described above and a third group of ACGG-eligible villages that
      ACGG did not choose for intervention to conduct a cluster-randomized controlled trial with
      the goal of evaluating the effect of the ACGG and ATONU interventions on maternal and child
      diets, nutritional status, and health.
    

Intervention name(s): ACGG; BCC
Intervention type(s): Other; Behavioral
Intervention description(s): 50 high-producing chicks to households along with provision of technical input on production; Nutrition sensitive BCC on poultry-specific aspects of nutrition, WASH, women's empowerment, and use of income combined with home gardening.
Other intervention name(s): Chicken intensification; ATONU
Allocation: Randomized
Intervention model: Parallel Assignment
Masking: None (Open Label)
Primary purpose: Prevention