Enugu, UNICEF Push Nutrition Drive to Local Governments as Expert Flags ₦1.69bn Budget Provision
By Chibuzo Obidike | IchieTimes
Enugu State is taking its nutrition campaign to the grassroots, with the state government and UNICEF training local government committees to ensure that interventions for vulnerable mothers and children translate into real services.
The training brought together members of Local Government Committees on Food and Nutrition from across the state, focusing on how to plan, finance, implement and monitor nutrition programmes at community level.
It comes months after UNICEF handed over essential nutrition commodities to Enugu, including 2,803 cartons of small-quantity lipid-based nutrient supplements, 843 cartons of ready-to-use therapeutic food and micronutrient supplements for pregnant women.
The supplies were funded through a ₦320 million Child Nutrition Match Fund, with Enugu State and UNICEF contributing ₦160 million each.
But beyond the delivery of nutrition commodities, a major issue raised at the workshop was whether budget commitments are translating into actual services for the people who need them.
Former Enugu State Commissioner for Budget and Planning and UNICEF public finance consultant, David Okelue Ugwunta, drew attention to eight nutrition-related project lines in the state’s Third Quarter 2026 Budget Implementation Report.
He said the projects had an initial combined budget provision of about ₦1.69 billion, but the report recorded no expenditure against them as of the end of September 2026.
He further noted that the revised aggregate provision had dropped to about ₦690 million, including a reduction in the allocation for Albendazole and multiple micronutrient supplements from approximately ₦1.03 billion to ₦30 million.
Ugwunta, however, warned against interpreting the zero expenditure entries as proof that no funds were released or that no services were delivered. He called for verification through procurement records, fund release information, commodity availability and distribution reports.
He also clarified that the expenditure recorded by the state Primary Healthcare Development Agency covered several areas of healthcare delivery and could not be treated as nutrition-specific spending.
Earlier, the state government, represented by Permanent Secretary Clara Nwakaego Eze, reaffirmed its commitment to ensuring that nutrition interventions reach vulnerable mothers and children.
UNICEF Nutrition Specialist Ngozi Onuora emphasised the importance of nutrition during the first 1,000 days of a child’s life, while Federal Ministry of Budget and Economic Planning representative Olalekan Adedun called for stronger grassroots governance.
The message from the workshop was clear: nutrition programmes must go beyond policy statements and budget figures. They require identifiable projects, adequate funding, timely implementation and monitoring to establish whether mothers and children are receiving the support intended for them.
