Supporting mothers and children in Tanzania with our inaugural programme

Prior to The Power of Nutrition and the World Bank’s programme in Tanzania, the country was experiencing strong economic growth and relative stability. However, 90% of the population were still living on less than $3 a day in 2012. Despite efforts by the Tanzanian government to improve people's quality of life, the country’s health outcomes were still lower than expected. For example, the maternal mortality ratio remained high at 556 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2015/6, against a backdrop of few newborn deliveries in facilities and limited family planning services. Likewise, stunting, where a child is too short for their age as a result of undernutrition, remained persistently high with one in three (34%) children under five stunted.

Our programme

The programme in Tanzania was our first partnership and investment. Together with the World Bank and the Government of Tanzania, we designed a programme to respond to these challenges. We mobilised resources from our platform donors, the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation and UK Aid, to increase the size of the programme, ensuring that nutrition interventions were prioritised to achieve a greater impact.

The programme worked to improve the access and quality of healthcare services with a focus on maternal, neonatal and child health. It did this by ensuring adequate and transparent funding was allocated whilst also improving the availability of essential medicines and generally the quality of care in facilities throughout the country.

Programme achievements

The programme contributed to a significant increase in the number of mothers and children who were able to access improved maternal, neonatal and child healthcare. By the end of the programme, 100% of children aged 12-59 months received at least one dose of vitamin A, up from just 51% in 2015. 37 million people received essential health, nutrition and population services; 11 million children were immunised, 20 million women and children received basic nutrition services and seven million deliveries were attended by skilled health personnel.

The programme also supported the refurbishment of 304 facilities providing maternal, neonatal and child health services, deployed 5,000 staff to these facilities and provided training in emergency obstetric and neonatal care which expanded the capacity to provide this kind of care to the population.

As well as its defined objectives, the programme contributed to other positive health outcomes. For example, during the programme period, the percentage of women of reproductive age using modern family planning methods increased from 37% to 42% between 2015 and 2020.

Next steps

Recent figures (as of 2022) show that stunting rates in Tanzania have indeed decreased since the programme began in 2016, with 30% of children under five stunted. Although this is a decrease of 4% in six years, more still needs to be done to support women and children in accessing nutritional products. Collaborative and impactful programming stands a good chance of continuing the positive outcomes seen by this programme, thereby contributing to a continuation in this downward trend in stunting levels in Tanzania.