We implemented Child Nutrition Improvement Project (CNIP) in Kon Tum Province, central Vietnam, since 2012 and provided cooking training, called “cooking demonstration”, to prepare nutritious complementary meals for over six months infants along with breast feeding. Recently, not only mothers, who are targets of the training, but also fathers and grandmothers participate in the training, and we see more families making efforts on raising healthy children.

After the cooking training, FIDR staff monitor each participant regularly by visiting them to check if they actually prepare their own complementary meals at home. What recently impress the monitoring team is “Build-in-Kitchens” organized by each mother.

“Build-in-Kitchen” is the name of the Japanese kitchen style. Generally, it has the cooking cabinet, sink, and storage and is already familiar in Japan. Why did the kitchen appear in Kon Tum Province?

The staff visiting each household for monitoring explain the change of the mothers participating in the project, “The ingredients and seasoning of meals in the past were very simple, and there were many households without a kitchen. Through CNIP’s activities, the mothers understood nutritious and familiar ingredients and seasonings, and more ingredients and seasonings became always on hand at their home. Moreover, one or two more dishes got to be prepared on the table than in the past.

Mother’s daily life is very busy with doing housework, raising children, and doing farming. Daily diet and kitchen where mothers prepare meals plays a crucial role for sustaining their family’s health, especially their children’s health. It could be a natural change for the mothers to keep the kitchen clean, convenient and organized.”

Cooking training and other activities of CNIP give an opportunity for the mothers to exchange information. “This is my build-in-kitchen. Please come visit and check it out!”