UNICEF to promote exclusive breastfeeding in West, Central Africa

UNICEF wants to help West and Central Africa achieve the global target of 50 percent exclusive breastfeeding by 2025. To this end, the UN agency and its partners have organised a regional workshop in Abidjan.

This regional workshop, which opened in Abidjan on Tuesday 12 March 2024, will end on 14 March 2024. It focuses on strengthening the monitoring and application of legal measures adopted to protect breastfeeding in West and Central Africa.

According to statistics, only 46 percent of newborns in the region are breastfed within the first hour of life, and in many countries in the region, a high percentage of children are given food other than breast milk.

Côte d’Ivoire’s Minister of Health, Public Hygiene and Universal Health Coverage, Pierre Demba, who officially opened the conference, welcomed the initiative, which aims to follow up the texts on the Food Code, but above all on breastfeeding.

“In Côte d’Ivoire, in addition to this Code, we have passed legislation to limit the marketing of milk substitutes in
supermarkets, and to ensure that these milk substitutes, which are supplements, are prescribed only by pharmacists,” he said.

“This meeting will enable us to assess what has worked well in our country, but also what has worked well in other countries, and to see how we can adopt a common plan to ensure that exclusive breastfeeding up to six months is applied in the sub-region,” he added.

For the Ivorian minister, giving women six months to breastfeed is beneficial for the well-being of their children, but for those who are in work, they may have to work out a schedule with their employer.

“Most countries in Europe allow long enough periods for mothers to look after their children and newborns. It’s something we’re going to explore, but we need to give ourselves time to adapt our legislation to this situation,” he went on.

By videoconference, Gilles Fagninou, UNICEF Regional Director for West and Central Africa, congratulated the State of Côte d’Ivoire and the National Council for Food, Nutrition and Early Childhood Development (CONNAPE) for the country’s deep commitment to giving every child the best start in life.

This commitment and these concrete results have motivated the organisers of this workshop to hold the event that brings us together today in Abidjan, which had already successfully hosted the launch of the “Stronger with breast milk only campaign in 2019,” he recalled.

This campaign, he said, is the fruit of collaboration between UNICEF, WHO, Alive and Thrive and the West African Health Organisation. During a recent visit to Côte d’Ivoire, Mr. Fagninou visited the Vridi Hospital in the south of Abidjan.

“Mother’s milk is unique: it is the first and best food for infants, and much more besides. Breast milk is the first vaccine, it makes the child stronger. Breast milk is also love and comfort,” he said.

Michelior Athanase Aissi, Director General of the West African Health Organisation (WAHO), hoped that breastfeeding women would be given six months or more to pass on the necessary maternal love to their children.

In West and Central Africa, 14 of the 24 countries have adopted a legal measure on the marketing of breast-milk substitutes that is substantially or moderately aligned with the WHA Code and resolutions.

The regional offices of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and WHO, the Helen Keller International Foundation, in collaboration with IBFAN and the West African Health Organisation, organised these meetings.

AP/fss/abj/APA